


Pell Grant Matrimony

by Sleepmarshes, sojustifiable



Category: Soul Eater
Genre: Alligators & Crocodiles, Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Excessive Butt Jokes, F/M, Fake Marriage, Glitter Fairy Pop God!Wes, Goth Burberry DTK, Humor, M/M, Recreational Drug Use
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-31
Updated: 2017-01-31
Packaged: 2018-09-21 02:17:50
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 47,510
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9527408
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sleepmarshes/pseuds/Sleepmarshes, https://archiveofourown.org/users/sojustifiable/pseuds/sojustifiable
Summary: Mama wants an update of Maka’s life, but there’s a severe lack of anything interesting to report. She’s stuck in an eternal rut, and the only excitement in her life is her steadily disappearing underwear.Thankfully, her cute neighbor gets her in touch with the panty-stealing culprit. Soul is sometimes evasive and secretive, though he makes up for it by showing her what it’s like to have fun on a regular basis. Just as Maka thinks she has exciting news to report to Mama, Soul turns out to be hiding more than exotic pets in the bathroom. The fake-married, secret dating AU you didn’t ask for.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> For Resbang 2016. Art by Adorabbey and Tilliquoi can be found on tumblr. Adulterclavis is the real MVP for editing this behemoth an hour before the deadline.

She never knew there were galaxy-printed spandex workout pants for men, but it is important to learn something new every day. Now if she could only get through Shoulder Bridge without blue-haired Animal Planet making obscenely loud noises on the mat next to hers, she might be less likely to strangle someone to death today.

Alas.

Most people would consider it poor form to grunt like a baboon while pelvic thrusting into the ceiling-- it's an embarrassing enough exercise on its own-- yet this 80's-legwarmer swolebro has infiltrated Maka's preferred Pilates class and appears to give zero shits about etiquette. Maka usually looks forward to the weekly class as a nice respite from kickboxing; tonight, she can’t wait for it to finish so she can bathe and try to wash those ungodly sounds from her ears.

Maka fully acknowledges that she has a short fuse-- which is why if Tsubaki doesn't change the pose soon, someone's about to be choked. She glances at the instructor for some sign that she’s not the only one trying to resist crushing this guy’s skull with her thighs. Tsubaki gives the slightest shake of her head, saying, “Alright, let’s switch to Bicycle,” because murder is, tragically, frowned upon.

The new pose should improve the whole monkey impression situation, but somehow her unruly mat neighbor manages to treat air-cycling like he’s a triathlon athlete on his way to the finish line. She’d consider leaving early if she wasn’t so determined to get her money’s worth out of her semester gym pass.

Faint echoes of crazed hooting ring in her head even after the class ends, filling the quiet of what should be a peaceful shower. Changing her workout schedule is looking pretty likely; she wants to be territorial over her slot, but there are no appropriate ways to fend off the bro-tank-wearing, neon-clad, mouth-breathing interloper. She feels sorry for whatever poor fool ends up marrying _that_ guy.

Maka steps out of the shower and examines her gym bag with the weariness of violated serenity. Getting dressed has become steadily less appealing ever since her _underwear collection_ had begun to mysteriously dwindle.

At first, she’d assumed there must be a pervert in her apartment complex sneaking into the laundry room while her clothes were in the dryer. Without spare funds for a security camera, she’d resorted to a more rudimentary test of sprinkling flour on the ground to check for footprints, but the only one coming in and out had been a cat. Theoretically, she could _guard_ her clothes while they’re in the wash, but at what cost? With no Wi-Fi and a residual dirty sock smell, Maka would like to minimize wasting her life watching alternating spin and rinse cycles.

She’s left to assume that one or more of the laundry machines literally eats panties.

Today, the underwear she’s packed in her gym bag are the most disheartened, battle-worn pair left in her drawers. Not only has the elastic completely lost its will to live, it tries to ascend from this planet -- slowly but surely, it pulls away from the rest of the fabric, making every attempt to jump ship. Clothes permitting, she’d rather go commando. Her skirt isn’t _that_ short, and her tights are pretty opaque; surely she can make it from here to the car, and then from the car into her apartment without flashing anyone.

Her drive home consists of wondering when she has time in her schedule to make a trip to Victoria’s Secret, and questioning whether Britney Spears wears anything under that red latex bodysuit since the radio has decided to throw her straight back to the year 2000.

Maka stops by the mailboxes before heading into her apartment, actually hoping for some catalogues and coupons so she doesn’t have to sell her kidney for reasonable panties. One of her neighbors is also in attendance, sifting through ads in search of gold. They’re an elderly person, tall but hunched, with an impressive mass of gray hair; she should be fine sneaking past if she just tugs the hem of her skirt down a little and takes small steps.

The fact that sneaking past an old guy while going commando is the most heart-pounding thing she’s done in months should probably say something about her life choices, but she tries not to think about it.

“Good evening,” she says in her best ‘speaking-to-the-elderly’ voice as she opens her mailbox.

He might be turning towards her, or he might not; she’s staring vehemently at his dorky shark slippers to avoid conversation when he says, “‘Sup.”

Her head whips up, startled by the nonchalant greeting along with how rumbly his voice is. Despite the heavy circles under his eyes, and the way his knitted eyebrows leave impressive wrinkles in his forehead, her mystery neighbor is clearly college-aged -- just with terrible posture and the most prematurely white hair she’s ever come across. What kind of course load does a person need to take for _that_ to happen?

Wholly unprepared for conversation and trying not to somehow unintentionally telecast that she has no underwear on, Maka stumbles over her own tongue. “Uh… Yeah. Get any good catalogues?”

“Take your pick.” He hands over his entire stack of recycle-bound advertisements. His face relaxes out of a scowl for only a second before he pulls a Victoria’s Secret catalogue out of his mailbox and hands it directly to her, muttering, “Dunno how I keep ending up with these.”

His jawline when he _doesn’t_ look pissed off is startling; it takes her a bit to collect herself and redirect her attention. “Thanks,” she says, hurriedly stuffing the busty, scantily-clad model to the bottom of her pile. Maka shuts her mailbox a little too hard and bolts for her apartment door. 

Gym clothes in hamper, regular clothes onto the chair, and disappointing panties in the trash, she makes the executive decision to stay inside for the rest of the night and slithers into some flannel pajamas. Sorting the mail turns up more catalogues, a paycheck she hurries to open, and a loan statement she’d rather forget.

She’s throwing out advertisements for clothes she probably shouldn’t buy when a thick manila envelope catches her eye. International stamps and a return address in Greenland have her heart in her throat. There’s only one person on that godforsaken ice sheet it could be, and Maka fishes out some scissors to cut open the envelope to keep it neat for filing.

The letter itself is long and filled to the brim with scientific jargon that makes Maka’s eyes glaze over; that or she’s tearing up, and she’d like to tell herself it’s the former. Mama never was good at writing to the common audience, so it’s a good thing someone else will be doing the write-up for her research. Maka leaves the ice cores and sediment layers for the inevitable reread and searches for more personal updates: everything is going well; she’s settled at the research station, and while mail is slow, it’s reliable.

Her mom requests a return letter. _‘Tell me something exciting you’ve been up to,’_ she writes, as if her daughter’s life is even half as interesting as hers. Mama wants pictures too, but Maka doesn’t know where the hell she’ll get them. It’s not like she has a camera crew taking candids of her riveting work, study, sleep routine. With a heavy sigh, she puts the letter at the front of her file-folder; a response will have to wait until she manages to do something worthwhile.     

* * *

 

Mechanically shoving a balanced breakfast into her mouth one cardboard-flavored spoonful of disappointing cereal at a time, she scrolls through Facebook with equal enthusiasm, pausing with mild interest to note which of her old highschool classmates have married straight after graduation.

A flash of neon blue catches her eye, commenting on Tsubaki’s crossover post from Instagram, no less. Friending her Pilates instructor has been useful for getting early updates on schedule changes, though her post-workout pictures are a little rough on Maka’s ego. It’s a mystery how someone’s hair can look so flawless after sweating so much.

Maka squints at the thumbnail commenting on Tsubaki’s photo, and sure enough, it’s that Kool-Aid colored hooligan. He even has a painfully fake pseudonym for a name. The comment: ‘Sick abs, bro u r SHREDDED,’ followed by a string of fire emojis. To be fair, Tsubaki totally _is_ shredded, but Maka is still annoyed on the other woman’s behalf.

With a disgruntled huff, she clicks through the various university groups she’s part of, just to clear the notifications. She’s not looking for any carpools, events to attend, or second-hand clothes since the garments she _needs_ really should be bought new. She keeps scrolling, aimless and automatic, until one stray, caffeine-deprived brain process recognizes her own building’s address in the title of a post.

It addresses ‘anyone living at 2400 Grignard.’ It must be someone posting about some misdirected mail or something. Lazy ass can’t even bother to knock on any doors. Clicking open the full listing quickly reveals why the poster wouldn’t want to bring up these misplaced items to anyone’s face: Maka is drawn into a blown-up photo of a cat nested in a sizable pile of what appears to be underwear. The stash is heaped up in the corner of the closet, with a meticulous tunnel wormed through it from which the offending feline’s smug face protrudes.     

The post itself is ridiculous, written from the perspective of the klepto-kitty herself, and with gratuitous amounts of cat puns. The owner is clearly a fanatical catmom.

‘You might think I’m kitten but I just love panties, so purr-lease come and pick yours up!’

At least at the bottom of this eyesore is a parenthetical addendum with instructions for making contact: (but fur-real, hit us up on this account and we’ll get you the goods)

One would think that she’d be able to find the owner by looking at the cat’s friend list, but ‘Blair’ seems to have only friended other pet accounts in some sort of underground circle of obsessive pet owners. The only real clue is the cover photo, which is an uncomfortable image of the same black cat sprawled over someone’s bald head in strange, boudoir style. Some old guy? Who’s a little too into taking pictures of his cat?

Against her better judgment, Maka sends a message to Blair The Cat asking for an apartment number and an appropriate time to come by. She’s hesitant to even bring up that travesty of an advertisement lest it turn out to be a prank, but she really can’t afford to buy new underwear every week with her minimum wage, work-study job.

Thankfully, whoever the owner is doesn’t respond in-character, and she receives another picture detailing the situation. This time the collection is laid out and arranged by color with the offending feline standing watch like she’s about to move her spoils to a better hiding place at a moment’s notice.

Maka groans when she immediately recognizes a couple pairs as hers _._

There’s an open invitation to come to apartment six ‘to go through the dragon’s hoard.’ Maka slaps on some clothes that she hopes will help her neighbor treat her seriously even after they find out she has more than one pair of animal printed panties. With a quick spray of perfume and a breath mint for good measure, she adventures into the unknown that is her bald neighbor in apartment six with the perverted cat.

Maka had been fully prepared for an eccentric old man with a million cat figurines, not her cute neighbor with the shark slippers and extra catalogues. Seeing him with low-riding sweatpants and a resting bitch face that could freeze over hell itself causes a flip-flop between two drastically different emotions: the relief of meeting again under better undergarment circumstances, and the alarming realization that he’s a pun-loving catmom.

She’s rendered dizzy and painfully ineloquent. “Y-you!” she blurts. “You’re the one with the panty-thieving cat?”

At least he has the sense to appear ashamed. Dropping the perma-scowl for a fraction of a second, he says, “Afraid so,” and proceeds to fake a yawn like a self-conscious tool.

“A panty-thieving cat for whom you made a Facebook profile?” Even knowing the answer, she needs the confirmation. If she fully convinces herself that the guy is an eccentric pervert, maybe she can stifle the low-key attraction.

“Actually, that would be my roommate trying to send himself gifts on FarmVille because it’s not 2010 anymore and no one gives a shit about his crops,” he replies, which is both relieving and troubling-- the former because he is less creepy than she’d assumed, the latter because he lives with someone _exactly as creepy as she’d assumed._

“Oh,” she says dumbly, still standing on the porch like a vampire waiting to be let in from the cold.

“We figured we’d post that ad from there so we could filter out any prank messages, but I recognized you from your profile.” Ah. Well that explains why she’s the only one gaping like a fish -- he’s not surprised to see her in the slightest. “Anyway, come in. Now’s the best time, since the cat’s out. She can’t try to steal them back.”

He leaves just enough space for her to squeeze past, almost like he’s hiding something, though the apartment looks normal enough once she’s inside. ...Normal in a slightly messy, bachelor-pad kind of way, but not entirely unpleasant. The sofa is pulled out into a sleeper, with a nest of blankets someone has clearly been sleeping in.

The bedroom looks like a Victoria’s Secret sale-bin after an army of housewives and their teenaged daughters have gone to battle and left victorious. Only roughly organized by size and shape, the panties take up the entirety of the bed and a good portion of the floor. Her neighbor coughs and gestures towards the buffet. “Take your time.”

It’s a little disconcerting having to pull her underwear from the masses while he looms in the doorway; her instinct is to worry that he’s judging her based on them, though it’s understandable he wouldn’t just leave a stranger alone in his bedroom.

Maka pulls one of her lacier pairs from the heap and hears a strangled noise behind her. “What?” she says, whipping around to face her neighbor who stands beet red in the doorway.

“Nothing…” he trails off for a second before blurting, “Congratulations.” A pained look crosses his face. “I’ll go,” he says, flustered and apologetic, and promptly disappears.

Time to bury them as far into her growing pile of sensible boyshorts as possible. There are several other racy pairs, but they’d been _pricey_ and, witnesses be damned, she’s not going to abandon them in the face of one tall, scruffy, and suspiciously good-smelling man who has an unfortunate habit of blurting exactly what he’s thinking.

Seriously, she got a good whiff coming in and no one has _any_ business waking up smelling so much like cloves.

Maka gathers up her loot. “I think that’s all of them.”

Apartment Six pokes his head around the doorway. “Okay. Sorry, again. Did I say that already?” he fumbles, though she can appreciate the effort. “Anyway, I didn’t realize the cat was using my closet to store stolen goods until they started to overflow.”

It’s a sizable collection to say the least; taking hers out of the mix barely put a dent in it.

“Uh… it’s fine,” she says on her way out to the living room. Then she realizes, courtesy of the stupid cat profile, she has yet to learn his name, and she stops in the doorway, determined to come out of this with at least enough information to stalk him properly on Facebook.  “By the way, my name is Maka.”

It came out so fast, she half expects him to ask her to repeat herself, but he just blinks. “I know. You’re the one who messaged me. Maka Albarn.”

“Oh, right. Well, the only profile I saw was for Blair the pun-loving cat.”

Realization dawns in his eyes. _Now_ maybe he’ll stop looking at her like she’s a scaly monster on it’s way to tear down Tokyo just because she decided to introduce herself. “Soul,” he says, hurriedly adding, “I’ll walk you out.”

She sees his hand in slow motion, reaching for her shoulder to presumably guide her to the door. But despite knowing it’s about to happen, she still flinches and trips over something very much _alive_ that had crawled up behind her feet. The cat?     

Though, she thinks, mid-flail with her requisitioned underthings, that it’s very scaly for a cat--

Soul tries his best to grab her hand, but it is otherwise occupied by lace and cotton. On her way to the floor, he wins the edge of a thong in his attempt to catch her fall and ends up with her underwear instead as she lands on her ass. Maka watches in horror as his gaze shoots from her face, to her high-riding skirt, and then to the stringy black piece in his hand. Suddenly aware of what he’s holding and where it goes, Soul drops it like a hot potato.

As she attempts to collect her scattered panties and shattered pride, Maka untangles herself from the animal underfoot, sees a long snout with far too many teeth, and _screams._

“T-that’s a-- that’s an _alligator!?_ ” She leaps to her feet and onto the nearest couch with all the grace of a newborn gazelle.  

“Yeah, sorry, shit-- she escaped the bathtub.” Soul grabs the toddler-sized animal behind the front legs and hauls it up from the ground with disturbing nonchalance. The creature waggles its stubby little legs in the air in a show of protest, though it looks more smug with itself than anything else.

Having a pervert cat was bad enough, but a predatory reptile? What kind of menagerie is he keeping in this place? “Why do you have an alligator?!”

“Another project of my roommate’s,” he answers with an eyeroll, as if it’s _that_ ridiculous to assume that he’d keep a large reptile around. Unperturbed by the flailing gator in his arms, he explains, “He says he _rescued her from the jaws of death,_ and won’t hear anything about taking her to a goddamn zoo. Don’t worry -- she’s totally harmless. Mostly.”

That is the opposite of comforting. “I think you should get a new roommate,” she says, mustering every scathing look in her repertoire. The longer she looks at the gator, however, the less threatening it appears, aided by the combination death metal vest and bedazzled collar it sports. It’s like the mascot of a biker gang. “Where did he even find one?”

“I dunno.” Soul shrugs, jostling the gator in the process. “We went to Florida and he smuggled Snappy in a cooler. I had no idea-- I’m a victim, here.”

“ _Snappy._ ” Inching off the couch, she dares to peek more closely at its face and miniature godzilla feet. “And you keep it in the bathtub?”

“Usually she just wanders around the apartment. I just put her in there since you were coming over. I should probably put her back, too... unless you wanna pet her. You kinda look like you wanna pet her.”

She considers it for just a moment but decides against it, only because it might be carrying salmonella. “I’ll, uh, pass,” she answers. “You can put her back on the floor though. No need to coop her up in the bathroom.”

“You’re not going to scream again?” He has the gall to smirk, and she vehemently shakes her head. This time she’ll be keeping her dignity intact.  

Tiny legs scrabble for purchase on the carpet as he lowers the animal to the ground. Maka expects Snappy to run under a table once freed, but the reptile just gives her a side-eye to rival the entire Kardashian family and hisses.

“What was that about?” she asks, more to the animal than her neighbor.

He’s holding in a laugh -- she can tell. “I guess she doesn’t like you.” 

That is slanderous. All animals like her. She’s an animal _whisperer._ Then again, this one has a brain the size of a golf ball so it could have poor judgment. “She belongs in a swamp.”

“Probably...” Soul says, watching as the gator waddles off to her bathtub oasis. “Don’t let my roommate hear you say that, though.”

“I’ll start a campaign: Return all gators to Florida,” Maka jokes.

It’s not a funny one if the look on Soul’s face is any indication. “Wait, you’re not going to tell people are you?”

“I mean, it’s pretty funny--”

He waves a harried hand. “You gotta keep it _secret_. You can't let the building manager know or I'll be living in a cardboard box.”

Woah. She hadn’t been thinking about it _that_ seriously, but when he says it with such an earnest expression, the atmosphere sobers. “Okay, chill, I won’t tell anyone you’re keeping an illegal reptile in your place. As long as you keep me updated if your cat goes on any more panty raids.”

Soul relaxes, shoulders sloping like he’s no longer under a bomb threat. Maybe that time she was actually funny. “Shit, yeah. I feel like I should get you something.” _Okay, Maka, don’t drop a cheesy pick up line about how he should get you his number._ “I guess I should give you my number in case anything goes missing again?”

Oh. Whipping out her phone at record speeds, she says, “Yeah, alright.” Just so he can have it, in case her panties get nabbed again. No other reason.

* * *

 

Because of the curse of alphabetization, Maka is forced to scroll past ‘Soul’ every time she wants to text Tsubaki for tips on squats and how to get her butt to look as nice as hers.

It’s been a week since exchanging numbers with Apartment Six, and now that laundry day has finally rolled along, she has half a mind to _not_ carefully keep inventory of her hamper’s contents (or even directly hand over a pair to the thieving cat) just to have an excuse to text her neighbor again.

That would be pretty pathetic, though. Underhanded. It’s not something she’d appreciate if someone were doing it to her. When the time comes, she’ll either work up the right words to type a concise message, or she’ll die trying-- if she would go so far as to consider sending a pair of panties as a form of communication, she may as well just bite the bullet and ask Soul on a date.

She mulls about what to say as she gets ready for her evening Pilates class. It’s as she’s in the car, ear plugs in her pocket, ready to face an hour of noises that could easily come from a live rendition of the Kama Sutra, that her phone buzzes. Her curiosity makes the phone burn in her pocket-- it could be fate, or it could be a notification about how she’s used up all her data this month researching alligators. But she’s already driving and she has a strict no-texting on the road rule.

She’s hardly out of her seatbelt before she’s checking her phone in the gym parking lot. _Damn._ If she’d opened the notification and seen the sender, she might’ve turned around and gone back to the apartment.

The message is titled ‘These yours?’ and enclosed is a picture of her prized Hello Kitty boyshorts. Her cheeks burn. How could she have missed such a gem among the commonplace beige and black of her collection? Too bad she’s already at the gym; if she goes back now, she’ll miss getting a spot in the front row, thereby securing a view of Tsubaki and _not_ intergalactic-printed mooseknuckle. Soul will just have to hold onto those for a little longer.

Maka starts to type a polite and apologetic response message. Yes they are hers, no she isn’t home right now. He’ll just have to wait, unless he wants to come to the gym.

 _Unless he wants to come to the gym._ At last, the perfect opportunity, assuming Soul isn’t the kind of guy who hates exercise -- he has to be doing something for his waist to look like that above his sweatpants. Deleting the latter half of her response, Maka quickly replaces it with a casual invitation to come to the Pilates class. Maybe things will work out in her favor this time.

A response buzzes in her hand almost immediately. Soul is on his way.  

With a quick change of her clothes, she’s ready to face him, hopefully looking sporty and put-together enough to make up for their first two trainwrecks of social interaction. Keeping one eye on the clock and the other on the parking lot, Maka waits with poorly-masked impatience. The blue-haired maniac goes by, and she prays to all that is good in the world that he won’t go for the front row-- that would be a sure-fire way to make sure Soul never accompanies her again, if he has any sense of self-preservation.

Finally, minutes before the class is about to start, Soul rolls up in basketball shorts of all things, but at least it looks like he’s ready to work out.

“Hey.” Maka waves from the doorway, internally reminding herself to keep it casual.

He returns the greeting and starts rooting around in his bag. “Hey I have your… thing.” _Well that doesn’t sound suspicious at all._

It becomes apparent he intends to hand over her panties here and now, like an alleyway drug deal sans alley or drugs, but she’s already put her gym-bag in a locker and has nowhere to put a very conspicuous, pink pair of underwear. “Wait,” she squawks. “I don’t have any pockets!”

“Oh.” Soul looks at the item in his hand as if he’s regarding a used tissue, reluctantly stuffing it back in his own bag. “Then when--”

“Um, were you planning on staying for the class?” Maka asks, because apparently she can’t let him get out a full sentence. He might be dressed more for some form of indoor sportsball, but asking is the best way to get answers.

The quick once-over he gives her doesn’t escape her notice. He’s not very good at eye contact, his glance flitting from her face to her feet to the ceiling in rapid succession. Soul clears his throat. “Sure, I guess. I don’t really know anything about Pilates, though.”

“It’s fine.” She’s quick to reassure. “It’s an all-level class, and there’s already one guy there who… well, let’s just say you can’t be worse than him.”

There’s one of those rare smiles of his, the kind that lifts his face a little lopsidedly but shows off a sneaky dimple usually hidden by his ultra-bored facade. “Yeah, alright.”   

She leads him up the stairs to Tsubaki’s yoga studio, craning her neck as they reach the top and praying to see not one, but two open spots in the front row. (Though if she had to take a spot behind her neighbor, she admits it would not be a harrowing sacrifice.)

As they round the corner, Soul takes in the fitness area with mild surprise. “I really oughta take advantage of this place more, if we’re paying for it with student fees anyways.”

Well, that confirms him actually going to the university, though that is something she should’ve put together if he has access to school-run pages on Facebook. She has yet to get a last name off the guy, though, and he catches her trying to sneak a glance when he digs out his I.D. to flash for the class.  

“Can I help you?” he asks, his disgruntled face belying the amusement in his voice.

Maka shakes her head and turns away with feigned disinterest; she’ll have to get another look when he shows the card at the door. She tells herself it’s the journalist in her that wants to know his last name for some good, old-fashioned Facebook digging (but it is also the journalist in her that says just asking him directly would be more logical by at least 100 percent).

As they walk along the half-assed one-sided mirror that makes up the outside wall of the studio, Maka takes one look inside and winces. The infamous ‘Black Star’ has already taken the prime spot, front and center, in Downward Dog.

“Shit,” she hisses as Soul places his bag in the nearby set of lockers. “That guy I hate is here, and he took the best spot too. I hope you have a strong stomach.”

Soul cranes his neck to survey the class inside. “Which guy?”

“That one, with the lightning tights and no sense to wear anything under them,” she murmurs. Then Soul has a reaction that goes above and beyond her expectations: a grimace, a groan of disgust, or even barfing in a trash can, she feels, would have all been appropriate responses to thunderballs over there, but her neighbor starts taking on the appearance of a dead fish. A look of horror etched on his face, Soul backtracks. Fast.

Alarmed, Maka asks, “Um, you okay?” Given the last time he’d had that look on his face there’d been an alligator involved, and she half-worries there’s _another_ creature scuttling around somewhere--

“Uh.” Already back at the locker and hastily making a getaway, he says, “Nope. Everything’s fine. Just remembered I have a... _thing_ , I need to do. Tonight.”

Okay, the tights are bad, but not _that_ bad. He’s already halfway down the staircase, and she gapes after his inexplicable retreat. Though it’s plainly obvious, she can’t help but ask, “You’re leaving?”  

Soul doesn’t even turn around. He just shouts back at her, “I’m sorry -- I can’t be here,” and jumps the last couple steps before rounding the corner and fleeing into the night.

Really?

* * *

 

There are fuckups like calling your professor, ‘Mom,’ and then there are fuckups like ditching your neighbor and running away with her underwear. Of those two parties, Soul is firmly the latter. And even as he’s trying to calm down over the fiasco that he’d just narrowly avoided, he’s also trying to figure out how he can possibly explain this away to Maka without sounding like an absolute loser.

Option one includes spilling the whole truth and nothing but the truth, while option two includes blatantly lying. The first would inevitably end in chaos, but the second in his eternal guilt.

How was he supposed to know that the guy she has a vendetta against would turn out to be his roommate?

He hadn’t wanted to start an altercation. Public scenes give him enough second-hand embarrassment when he doesn’t know the parties involved, but a confrontation between Black Star and their cute neighbor gives him hives at the mere thought. If his roommate didn’t jump on the opportunity to make a loud and doubly unnecessary scene, Maka surely would’ve started something over the dumb alligator. Both options are crises he managed to avert -- but in his desperation to avoid them, he thinks he’s created a new one.

Besides, he’d borrowed some of Black Star’s shorts without asking, and if that came to light, it would give the _wrong signal._

He spends more time concocting an apology text than he’s ever spent on school papers, but it still doesn’t feel right without some kind of peace offering to make it up for her.

Of course, there’s the question of what Maka even likes. The only intel he has from all two-and-a-half conversations they’ve had is that she’s athletic and, if her Facebook profile picture is any indication, she enjoys outdoorsy crap like camping.

 _‘Hey, wanna go to the forest, alone, with a guy you barely know?'_ Soul can picture the accusations already. It doesn’t help his case that he’s still in possession of her undies.

Besides, the photo looks a little dated; there’s no telling how her interests have changed since high school. This calls for some ‘ _research’--_ Maka’s profile is excessively open _._ Her email, phone number, and former employers are all listed, but most importantly: her list of likes.

A terrible collage of one-hit wonders, bad dubstep, trance, and _reggae?_ makes up her music list. The favorite books list is more well-populated, but buying a present seems a little high-pressure, and there’s also the chance that she already owns everything on her list. Out of curiosity, Soul googles her favorite authors, each one turning up the same, horrifying answer.

Poetry. Lots of it.

...Making amends might be tougher than he thought.

* * *

 

Soul goes about his routines, attending class semi-regularly, escaping his dilemmas with video games, and buying another load of raw chicken for Snappy. He keeps an eye on the public notice boards, hoping for something appealing that Maka might enjoy.

Bold, curling script catches his eye on the third day. The advert is a design student’s worst nightmare, but it has some promising key phrases. He doesn’t know what could possibly be ‘slammed’ in regards to spoken verse; it sounds suspiciously like either a rap battle or a sporting event, but he doubts a better opportunity will fall in his lap than this. He takes a flyer home.

First things first: he feels it would be more sincere to apologize in person, so Soul starts with a text his mother would be proud of: _[[I realized I still have something of yours. Is there a time I can drop it off that would be convenient for you?]]_

Maka doesn’t respond for a while, but just when he’s starting to think that she’s decided to sacrifice her underwear to never have to see him again, his phone buzzes.

_[[sorry, just got off work but i’m home now if you want to run over. i’m in 14]]_

Soul shoots back a quick, _[[sure thing be right over]]_ because if Maka doesn’t use capitalization in her texts he sure as hell is going to cancel autocorrect to do the same. With an extra layer of deodorant and a clean sweatshirt, he’s ready for battle.

Praying she’ll accept his apology and offer of slam poetry, he knocks on Maka’s door. He’s not expecting a warm welcome, but he’s taken aback by her sizzling death-glare as she stands in the doorway, blocking any entry or view into her place.

“Hey.” Soul hands over Hello Kitty underwear like a ransom, hoping for just a couple minutes of her time. “Sorry about the other day.”

After searching for a nonexistent place to put them, she realizes a little too late that her pants, once again, are bereft of pockets. Valiantly trying to keep her eye-contact scathing, Maka hesitates for just a moment before unzipping her hoodie, shoving her underthings inside, and zipping it back in the span of two seconds. Soul wants to make a joke about the alien lump in her clothes, or the fact that her tanktop matches her drawers -- but that’s probably not a good idea when she looks like she has murder at the forefront of her mind.

She doesn’t slam the door in his face, which is a good sign, but she doesn’t reply either.

“Right. So, that guy you pointed out at the gym… that’s my roommate.”

A single eyebrow raises. “You run and hide when you see your roommate in public? Don’t you _live_ together?”

Yes, actually, he does make it a habit to avoid running into Black Star if he can help it; the guy is very good at putting on a show and drawing attention to himself and anyone he’s with. “Uhh… Truthfully, I borrowed his basketball shorts because I don’t have any. And if he saw, things would have...gone awry.”

Maka is not convinced. “He doesn’t seem that bad,” she says, crossing her arms and shifting her weight to one hip-- it’s horribly distracting. “I mean, I think he’s an **ass** , but a harmless one. Are you really that scared of him?”

While he’s more afraid of getting an aneurysm from Black Star’s antics than coming to any actual harm, for the sake of ending this conversation as cleanly as possible, he says, “Maka, the guy keeps an alligator as a pet.”

“Just a little one,” she shoots back. Her shoulders relax, and her arms loosen their tight-knit hold. “But, I see your point, maybe. You still could’ve told me before _abandoning_ me and fleeing into the night.”  

“I know I left you hanging, but--” It’s time to fish out his invitation.  “I saw this thing, and thought maybe I could make it up to you?” He’s hoping Maka actually _wants_ to go, and he’s not pressuring her into weird, social obligation.

Soul holds the flyer out for inspection, and she squints at it with all the scrutiny of a judge overlooking new evidence. It makes him squirm, but he’d still take this over a public Black Star vs. Maka showdown any day.

Finally, she speaks. “How did you know I like poetry?”

 _Caught._ “Ffffffffacebook.”

Her mouth opens, but nothing comes out. She shuts it again with a grumble. “And you’re not going to stand me up again?”  

“Of course not.” Her scowl is piercing, like he’s placed under interrogation. “Well, okay, no promises if Black Star shows up. S’not really his scene though, so I think we’ll be safe.”

She doesn’t laugh, but he catches the hint of a poorly contained smirk. “Tell me that isn’t his real name.”    

“Technically it’s Bartholomew -- Bart for short,” he says. “But that has resulted in some terrible rhymes so it’s in everyone’s best interests to just call him Black Star.”      

That earns him a smile. Ha. If only it was a joke. “Okay,” Maka says. “But just because I’ve been wanting to see this guest poet live for a while. I’ve seen videos of her on youtube and she goes _hard.”_

“Um. G-good. Great.” Is this where the slamming comes in? Soul almost regrets asking her to come if there’s going to be legitimate fighting, like some form of wrestling recital. If there’s audience participation involved, he doesn’t stand a chance-- he knows exactly who’ll get slammed.

Rocking on her heels in the doorway, Maka clasps her hands behind her back. It’s a sign of openness if he’s ever seen one after years of being told to uncross his arms and stop slouching, but he can’t stop glancing at the misshapen wad in her sweatshirt. Now he’s just thinking about underwear, and how he intimately knows her intimates.

“So… I’ll meet you there Friday?”

Soul snaps out of weird underwear analytics. “Cool, yeah. See you then.”

The door closes. His shoulders fall, restless air rushing from his lungs. Now that that’s been smoothed over for the time being, it belatedly occurs to him that this might be considered a date.

“...Fuck.”

* * *

 

At least Soul had been able to read up what the event would actually be like by the time Slam-Night arrives -- theoretically there won’t be anything more violent than impassioned poetry reading. Normally the thought would bore him out of his mind, but he hadn’t asked Maka to go because _he_ was interested in poetry. And honestly, he’s just relieved there won’t be a mosh pit.

He’s digging through the clean pile of clothes in mild desperation for something cool to wear when he registers a presence in the room: an easy-to-detect aura of Dorito breath on the back of his neck.

“You going out tonight?” Another chip crunch and the sickening sensation of cheese dust on his skin. He’s supposed to meet Maka on campus in twenty minutes and his roommate couldn’t have worse timing.

Soul pulls some passable black jeans out of the heap. “Yeah, and no, you can’t come.”

“Like I’d want to be seen in public with _you_ ,” Black Star scoffs. “I got better shiz to do than hang out with you when you’re wearing hipster pants.”

As used to annoying comments as he is, Soul can’t help but balk when someone determined to relive everything that went wrong with 80’s fashion is chirping on his wardrobe choices. “What’s wrong with them?”

“Relax -- _all_ your pants are hipster pants. The second you put ‘em on your scrawny ass, all that snobbery comes to the surface.” A hearty smack on his shoulder punctuates Soul’s mental suffering. “‘S’why I can’t have you borrowing my clothes. Harshes my vibe.”

“Whatever. See you later,” he grumbles. “Why don’t you go check on your allidaughter.”

Soul has a mile-long list of things he can shit-talk about Black Star, but the guy is at least a dedicated pet-parent. Just a mention of the alligator sends him out of the room cooing her praises. Soul grudgingly puts on his hipster pants in relative peace, and makes his way over to the college.

Maka is already standing outside the student event center when he gets there, and he realizes that they probably could’ve carpooled. If she’d be up for a spin on the motorcycle, that is.

 _Next time,_ he tells himself. Well, barring any additional Fuckups.

“Hey,” he says. Calm, cool, collected, and not distracted by mascara-framed eyes.

As she shoves her phone back into her purse, her eyes make quick work of the hipster pants. If she has any thoughts about his appearance, they are not apparent in the least. He supposes not recoiling in disgust like Black Star counts as a silver lining. “Hey.”    

Greetings out of the way, Maka nods her head towards the door and leads him into the uncharted territory of live poetry reading. The whole thing is hosted in a conference room, folding chairs lined up before a podium which functions as a makeshift stage.

Ever on the lookout for food-- the best distraction in unknown social situations-- Soul spies a promising table on the side of the room. Alas, it only has a coffee dispenser and powdered creamer, but he sidles over anyway.  

“You want any coffee?” Soul asks, pouring himself a cup in case the slam really does bore him to the point of passing out.

Maka shakes her head. “I’m alright, thanks.”

Figures. She’s probably fueled by rousing verses on modern social issues -- which is what his tour of YouTube has told him these things are all about. They take their seats and wait for the lights to dim.

The first poet kicks it off with the most bleak personal story Soul has heard to date. Forget falling asleep-- he should’ve been worrying about second-hand misery. All around it’s a surreal experience, with people grunting in the middle of performances that give him flashbacks to Black Star doing push-ups in the living room, which is, unfortunately, mood-ruining.

Maka seems to be enjoying herself, though. He can’t help but sneak occasional glances, and she looks _enraptured._ He’s relieved to have done something right.

Not all of the poetry is bad, either. Some of it is a little more personal information than he’s ever wanted to know about strangers, and Soul’s second hand embarrassment kicks in _hard_ for a guy explicitly sharing details about his breakup. But not it’s not a bad experience.

“So do people just go up on stage in the moment?” He whispers in Maka’s ear between poets. “Is it open mic?”

She bumps her shoulder into his. “Why? You have something you wanna share up there?” she asks, wearing a smile borders mischievous.

His face heats up. “What? _No,_ ” Soul hisses. “Just curious about the process -- I‘ve never been to one of these before.”

“For this… they probably had to sign-up before.” Maka murmurs, breath playing against his ear and lighting up his nerve endings. He needs to stop drinking this coffee. “Sometimes they’re competitive, too, but since these are amateurs, I can’t imagine that’s the case.”

He blinks. Leaning to her ear in reply, he asks with a grin, “Is that some low-key elitism I hear?”  He is immediately rewarded with some silent stammering and poor attempts at denial.

“N-no, I-- well, I mean, I _do_ have some experience, so.” She wears an abashed smile, her heels knocking together idly under her chair and, damn him, Soul can not figure out why he finds the faint streak of arrogance painfully attractive. Their conversation is cut short by another poet starting, which is for the best because he has a moment to gather his scattered thoughts.

After what seems like a parade of mediocrity, the featured poet, Jacqueline Dupre, clambers to the podium, and his neighbor practically trembles with excitement. He’s not sure what’s so special about some sapphic love poems and anger at the patriarchy but Maka is _into_ it. She sits on the edge of her seat, hanging on every single venomous word the woman on stage spits out.

In the midst of enthusiastic applause, he leans over to ask her, “So what kind of experience? You ever go and read up there?”

“Just once in high school,” she says, stopping to whistle her approval between two fingers. “I don’t think it was even my best work, but I had some words to say involving castration.”

Her nonchalance is disorienting. "That's uh. Not inspired by real-life events, I hope?"

"Oh, no I've never castrated anyone. The poem was definitely dedicated to my father, though."

There's only a few things that come to Soul's mind in which a daughter castrating her own father seems like a rational response, and he doesn't want to inquire if any of them are applicable so he simply opens his mouth and nervously says, "Uhhhh--"

"He cheated on my mom," she says.

Soul grimaces. "Gotcha." He leans down to put the coffee under his chair, in time-out. "That's pretty shitty."

He is immediately seized by her eyes after that comment, her excitement for Dupre halted in its tracks. Her intense gaze feels like she’s slapped a ruler to his entire existence. “What is?" she carefully asks.

“Your old man.” Jacqueline beings another reading, so Soul leans over to quietly add, “It’s uncool to cheat."

When he leans away, Maka slowly returns her attention to the reading, though it’s clear it’s not out of rapt interest anymore, but rather a perfunctory politeness for the poet. It only lasts a few moments before she’s back in his space again, something a little more confidential in her tone when she murmurs, “I can’t stand anyone who even thinks about it.” And then, in a voice that makes his toes involuntarily twitch in his boots, “But... you seem alright."

Their conversation is promptly interrupted by Jacqueline's voice rising in a maelstrom of rant, only thinly veiled with enough alliteration and dramatic pauses to pass as poetry. The small crowd eats it up like it’s gospel rather than a think-piece on why men cat-call. It ends, and Soul claps along with everyone else, though he’s still preoccupied thinking about the small bits of information he’s piecing together about his neighbor.

Truthfully, he’d like to invite Maka over to the apartment to have a conversation that doesn’t involve standing in apartment hallways or whispering in public. But he doesn’t want to offer her to come over for tea and have her misunderstand-- also there’s a good chance Black Star is home, and he’s not ready to open that can of worms yet. Or ever.

The event ends, and they shuffle outside with everyone else. Any further invitation is stuck somewhere between his throat and the realization that he actually wants to socialize with someone on purpose. This is when his trainwreck of a thought process is interrupted by a familiar and unmistakable mass of black clothes and an abundance of silver rings. Shit.

Soul grabs Maka’s hand and yanks her around to the other side of a pillar, safely out of sight. He peeks around the corner as the crowd disperses and lets out a sigh of relief once the danger passes.

“Um?” Only now does he realize he’s backed his neighbor against a pillar, his hand still locked around hers while she raises a wary eyebrow.   

Soul drops her hand like it’s on fire and stumbles three steps backwards. “Sorry, just saw someone I know.”

“Your roommate?” Maka asks, rubbing her wrist.

While he struggles to come up with a sane explanation, his neighbor’s eyebrows continue to steadily ascend to another plane. He can’t get out of this one. With a sigh, he says, “Worse -- the building manager.”

Incredulous, she says, “ _Mortimer._ He’s even more harmless than Black Star!”

He bites the inside of his cheek, hoping for a way to explain without sounding like an asshole. “Every time I run into him, he keeps trying to make _friends--”_ Soul waves a hand at the offence on her face. “Listen, it’s not that I think he’s bad or anything, it’s just that I really can’t risk him dropping by to hang out and finding a two-foot long reptile running loose in the place,” he explains. “I’m trying to not get evicted, remember?”

“Oh.” The logic sinks in, her mouth twisting into something less angry. “I still don’t get why you’re _keeping an alligator,_ but are you sure Mortimer would report you? If he wants to be friends--”

“Maka, the guy is so straight-laced he makes a corset look lazy.”

She gives him the blandest of looks for that, but it does slowly change as she brings a hand to her mouth in consideration. “...I _do_ live in the constant fear that he’ll find out about my candle collection.”

“Candles?” he teases. “You scoundrel.”

“I am a wild animal,” she says with a smile, though she sighs after a moment, primly lacing her fingers together. “Actually, I’m really not. This is the most exciting thing I’ve done in a long time, to be honest. So, thanks. I had fun.”

Soul shoves his hands in his jacket pockets so he doesn’t nervously run them through his hair. “Uh, cool. I’m glad you liked it,” he says to her shoes.

Despite all his wishing, she asks, “And you? How’d you like your first slam?”

”It was...” He really should’ve quit while he was ahead. “Interesting.”

He looks back up in surprise when she snorts and says, “That’s generous, most of it was terrible. All the breakup poems? Melodramatic.”

Soul heaves a big sigh of relief. “A scoundrel _and_ a snob,” he says, laughing. “But yeah, it was different. I had fun, though.”

“Cool,” she says, her lashes fanning out on her cheeks as her eyes close with a smile, and Soul finds himself desperately hoping he doesn’t turn whatever this is into another fuckup.

* * *

 

Something very strange is going on-- _besides_ the thing about Maka having feelings outside of the ones induced by exercise endorphins. Soul has been friendly enough in the weeks following their horrendous poetry experience; he’s chatty outside the mailboxes, sends her pictures of Snappy and the cat cuddling in the bathtub. He also has the tendency to change topics without warning, and will run off when she’s in the middle of a sentence. Something is fishy and it’s not Snappy.

The last straw is, of all things, when he doesn’t accept her as a friend on Facebook despite merrily sending her Snapchats as if he hadn’t seen her request. It feels like a petty reason to get worked up on it’s own, and she had, admittedly, only figured out his last name from the latest Victoria’s Secret catalogue (which he insists is the remnants of one of Black Star’s pranks that he can’t seem to unsubscribe from no matter what he tries). To make matters worse, he’s making such a disgruntled face at the camera in his profile picture it’s as if he’s silently calling her out for going so far as to resort to internet stalking. But really, he started the Facebook sleuthing first, and how can he confide in her about Black Star’s horrendous Dorito habits in late-night text messages but not accept her request?

Maka gets home from work and wakes up her poor, decrepit laptop to check the state of her friend request once again, but her already glacial internet appears to be on the fritz. Such is the life of a student who should’ve sprung for high-speed but lacks a roommate to split the bills. Maybe Soul had the right idea there, despite weirdos and alligators.

Even though she’s only been home a minute, she packs her laptop up and heads back to campus to utilize the free WiFi. The coffee shop in the library is crawling with people, though, and _loud._ Is nothing sacred? Libraries are supposed to be quiet, safe places for studying. Or researching your cute neighbor to find out what his problem is.

There’s live music, and terrible, at that.  A handwritten sign by the door reads ‘Open Mike Night’, and she may not be musically educated, but Maka can sense something seriously wrong is going on up on the makeshift stage. Nevertheless, Maka scopes out an empty corner next to an outlet, because stubborn determination could be put on her resume. On her way there, however, tousled white hair catches her eye like a beacon, and though she hates that she’s developed neighbor-radar, maybe she can nail down some info with a primary source interview.

“Hey.” She slides into the chair across from Soul, leaving her laptop stowed away in her bag.

To his credit, he only _almost_ spills his tea on his lap, pulling off a last-ditch save. He quickly sets it on the table, and flips over his phone which he’d been staring intently at before she’d sat down. “Uh. _Hi._ Didn’t see you there.”

“Am I interrupting something?”

“Nope.” He checks his phone quickly, then stuffs it in his pocket. “Just surprised me -- didn’t know this would be up your alley.”

“It’s up yours?” A wobbly guitar ends on a high note, literally, and is replaced with a banjo and accordion duo leaves her cringing.

Soul squints and sips his drink. “Not exactly… Let’s just say you’re not the only elitist. What’re you doing here?”

“Research,” she blurts before she can think of anything else. “I didn’t know there’d be music.”

He mumbles, “I mean, I guess you could call it that.” He leans back, balancing on two legs of his chair while donning the least-convincing face of innocence anyone has ever attempted. That lopsided smile makes her temporarily forget she’s trying to figure out what secret he’s been keeping from her.

Maka folds her arms on the table, businesslike. “Are you implying you have some sort of music experience?”

All four legs of his chair return to earth as he looks askance and scratches the side of his nose. “Yeah, a bit.” He brings his hands forward, fiddling with the salt and pepper caddy on the table as he leans over so she can hear him over the performers. Tells her he grew up in music, but it wasn’t his scene, and he gave it up to study audio engineering instead. He doesn’t play anymore, but he likes going to concerts for the fun of it, even if he mostly just cringes at open mic sessions.

“What about you? What do you do?” he asks.

The one-eighty on the small talk gives Maka whiplash, but she can roll with it-- this is how a normal conversation with normal people is supposed to work, probably. Except she doesn’t have much of anything interesting to say. “I’m majoring in journalism,” she tries. “And I work for the school paper, which takes up most of my free time.” _‘Most’_ meaning ‘all’ in this case, but he doesn’t need to know that.

Soul stretches his arms behind his head, back to the chair balancing act. “Man, I’d love to get a journalism pass to get up in front at shows. D’you ever get to write reviews? Go to movies for free?”

If only. “Unfortunately, I got saddled with the university finances section.”

“Oh. That sounds…”

“It’s the most boring thing I’ve ever done.” Maka chews her lip. How does she explain that she got stuck with the least desirable section of the paper because she has the least entertaining writing style, if it can even be called ‘style’. She has no interesting experiences to draw from to even have a style. “I guess someone has to do it.”

The chair returns with a thump, just like her grounded dreams. With a grimace she hopes is out of sympathy, Soul says, “Man, that is a lot of suck _._ They should let you do something fun _occasionally,_ get out and breathe some fresh air.” The way he describes it makes it sound like she’s locked up in a dungeon like a monkey with a typewriter, but considering the basement she works in, it’s not entirely erroneous. “You really oughtta try for a media pass for concerts. They let you behind the barrier, you have a good time, and you also don’t have to _touch_ other people.”

Maka doesn’t know how much of that was supposed to be funny, but she laughs anyway because her life is the real joke here. “I’ve never even been to a concert -- unless you count _this._ ”  

They both glance up at an Eminem-wannabe on stage struggling his way through a montage of what wasn’t Slim Shady’s best work to begin with.

“No. I definitely do not count this.” Eyes dead and disappointed, her neighbor downs the rest of his tea like it’s a glass of cheap whiskey before rubbing his face. “I don’t even know why I come to these things; the second hand embarrassment kills me.”

“Masochism?”

“I guess that’s what it’s called, isn’t it. Caught me.” That lazy, half-formed smirk she’s grown accustomed to makes a comeback. “You know, if you’re looking for an actual concert experience, my brother is playing in this music festival next month. I could ask if he can hook me up with some tickets?”

That sounds expensive, and like far too much of a gift for their brief acquaintanceship. “That’s… really, really generous. I don’t know, though, that’s a lot--”

“Oh no, I wouldn’t expect you to pay for anything. I wouldn’t expect **me** to pay anything, either-- he usually buries me in tickets to begin with. He pretty much expects me to advertise for him, so you’d be doing me a favor in the end.” Soul casts his eyes down and thumbs the edge of his cup absentmindedly. “You don’t even have to go with me, bring another friend.”

He makes it sound like not a big deal at all. Question then is: what friend? “We’ll see, I dunno if I’d even be able to,” Maka mumbles as noncommittal as possible.

“Yeah, alright.” He shrugs, either uncaring or at least pulling off a good impression. The prospective rapper on stage finally ends his reign of terror with an emphatic string of curses, but there’s nothing on earth that could make his ripped designer jeans look hardcore. Applause is scarce, the crowd immediately talking over the kid’s exit speech.

The library is overcome with a sudden hush when the stage goes dark, a bright spotlight centering on the stool in the middle. None of the earlier performers had gotten this dramatic treatment, and she watches as an uneasy frown crawls across Soul’s face. A figure walks on stage and someone in the cafe screams.

Soul stands up from the table with a clatter. “ _I need to go, bye-_ ”

“What? Why?” Maka rises with him-- his shady behavior has finally shown its face, and she is determined to get to the root of it. She hurriedly grabs her bag and follows him through the library.

“That,” he hisses, thumbing to the stage where everyone is starting to crowd, “would be my brother.”

“The one you were just talking about? Don’t you want to say hi?” So many questions with so little time; she hurries out the door after her neighbor, now even more confused than when she’d walked in.

“ _I really don’t._ He graduated from here a few years ago, everyone still loves him, and he loves the attention. I don’t need him dragging me up in the spotlight too-- oh God--” Soul abruptly stops mid-stride, looking even more beleaguered than before. “If he’s in town, it’s only a matter of time before he finds where I live.”

“Oookay.” Whatever bizarre relationship he has with his brother aside, this sudden onset of dodgy behavior is all so logical it annoys her to pieces. She hasn’t found any holes to poke in his watertight story. She sighs, disappointed. “Are you going home then? Did you drive?”

“Nah, got here before paid parking ended. I took the bus.”

Well, here’s her chance for Super Sleuth round two. “You want a ride?”

He blinks, as if remembering that they do, in fact, live in the same building complex. “Sure.”

Score. There’s another solid ten minutes to glean more information off of him, so while they walk to her car, Maka gets ahead of herself and goes for gold. “So, I added you on Facebook... weeks ago.”

“Buh huh?” His forehead is a mass of wrinkles as he waits for her to unlock the car door. “Oh, I guess I’ve been logged into the cat’s account since I discovered her illicit stash. ...How’d you find my profile anyway?”

She feels a guilty need to cover her tracks, so she tries with, “How many people do you think are named ‘Soul’ on Facebook?” and slides into the driver’s seat. “You keep a tight lock on it though -- a little unfair considering you could just go look at all my stuff from high school.”

“Not my fault you don’t have any privacy settings,” Soul easily retorts. Maka thinks she can hear a sneaky grin in there, but when she shoots him a scowl while starting the engine, he’s slipped back into his enigmatic facade. “Anyway, I didn’t see any request, unless you wanna be Facebook friends with Blair.”  

“Maybe I do.” Her inability to find the source of his suspicious behavior is annoying, but his ability to erase that suspicion and make her feel at ease so easily may be even moreso. “Maybe I wanna know what kind of fiend has such a fascination with my underwear.”      

He scoffs, his phone casting an unnatural glow on his features as he scrolls -- hopefully in the process of accepting her damn friend request so she can get some real research done. Her phone remains silent throughout the short ride home, however; no fateful ping arrive to set her faith in stone. Once she parks, he does look her straight in the face and says, “You could come up and meet the cat if you want. I bet Snappy would be happy to see you.”

“You’re just saying that,” she deadpans.

He unbuckles his seatbelt with a shy kind of smile. “You’re definitely in her top three people.”

Something about the way he says it reminds her of her Papa referring to her as his favorite daughter when she’s an only child. “And how many people have you introduced her to?”

“Psh. _That’s_ irrelevant, you wanna come say hi?”

She’s not opposed, but the important part is that she wouldn’t mind spending more time with Soul. It can’t just be about the alligator, right? She hopes not. “Yeah, okay.”     

The cat appears at the door the second Soul unlocks it, wailing like she hasn’t seen a person in weeks. Her neighbor unceremoniously scoops her up and deposits her into Maka’s arms with a grunt. “Meet Blair.”

Apparently a pervert through and through, Blair shamelessly kneads Maka’s chest and starts up a purr akin to a tractor engine. “Oh,” she says dumbly, unsure how to proceed while being groped by a cat. “She’s friendly.”

“Never seen her do that before, maybe she recognizes your sm-- uh. ...Detergent?” He better thank his stars that she’s too busy disentangling claws from her shirt to do much more than glare at him and return the frisky feline. Exasperated and juggling his keys with the cat who’s still avidly trying to get its paws back to business, Soul says, “Why don’t you just come inside.”

The place is mostly the same as Maka remembers it, sans the sprawl of panties reminiscent of the outlet mall, and the pull-out bed now in proper couch mode. Blair scampers off under a coffee table once they’re through the door and Maka sighs with relief; it’s tough trying to appear cool and collected while being accosted by tiny kitty claws.

Even if it had been true before, they’re now very much _alone,_ which she’d like to think somehow holds meaning. It may have been a couple years since she’s last had a date, but she’s not stupid. He took her to a poetry reading for god’s sake.

“You want something to drink?” Soul asks, leaning over the breakfast bar. “Water? Tea? Beer?”  

“Water’s fine,” she says. No need to get drunk and lose what little charm she has; she is a graceless drinker. “Where’s your bathroom?”

“Just across from the bedroom,” he answers, gesturing vaguely.

If she had thought about it for an extra five seconds, she would have realized his apartment is a carbon copy of her own, but with more band posters and a respectable TV. Maka half expects to see the alligator in the bathtub and she’s a little disappointed to see it empty, despite herself.

She checks her face in the mirror; it’s not the _worst_ she’s looked despite the dark circles and smudged eyeliner. At least her teeth are clean. Then something nudges her foot and she doesn’t even need to see it to know; willing herself not to scream, Maka steels herself to look down at the reptile on the floor.

She’d neglected to check behind the toilet. “Hey there… buddy,” she says evenly, hoping the gator can’t smell fear. Snappy makes a chirping noise in the back of her throat, and not knowing if it’s a sign of friendship or a war cry, Maka cautiously opens the door, letting the Snappy waddle out first. She breathes a sigh of relief-- that wasn’t so bad.

Out of the restroom, Maka’s only just slumped into an armchair when a glass of water appears in front of her. Soul smiles, that dimple appearing again. “I see you made a friend.”

“Alligators don’t hold grudges, do they?” Accepting the glass, a note is quietly penned in the back of her mind regarding the warm, brief meeting of their fingers.

“Not that I know of.” Soul sits on the couch across from her, and Maka eyes the way his knees point towards hers and tries to calculate the space between them. A safe distance -- not invasive, but close enough to notice his eyes are more burgundy than brown.

There’s a still moment, maybe the first one without any bad performances in the background, and Maka is uncomfortably aware of hearing her own, sharp breath before Soul breaks the silence again. “I’m glad I ran into you at the coffee shop; I wasn’t sure when I’d see something fun to invite you to, again.”

Her fingers idly squeak around the glass in her hands. He’d wanted to ask her out somewhere again? Does that mean the poetry slam  _had_ been a date? “I’m not picky,” she says, her cheeks warming. She takes a nervous sip of water; sets the glass on the table so it doesn’t slip out of her sweaty hands. “Feel free to pick something you actually like next time.”

“Yeah?”

“Mhm.”

She doesn’t expect the brief, but solid eye contact when he quietly says, “I’ll keep that in mind.”

Her gaze snaps to the coffee table as he sets his own drink down. Both his hands are now free to push his hair out of his eyes and yank her attention back to his face and the small smile there.

“You know, I--” A key rattling in the front door interrupts her from saying something she maybe shouldn't, and she's now witness to Soul readying for impact like a squirrel before a pickup truck. It must be Black Star, which is a disheartening turn for the evening. But if she’s willing to see more of Soul, she’ll have to get used to his roommate eventually-- might as well make a good impression by being friendly to him now. “Hello?” she calls, craning her neck to peek around the door as it opens.

Gatorade-blue hair pops in to ruin whatever moment she and Soul may have been having. Rounding the corner with a yodel caught mid-way in his throat, Black Star notices her, his roommate, and the distance between them, assessing the situation so quickly that a wave of dread crashes over her.

She manages a faint wave. “Hey--”

He cuts her off by traipsing to the couch and depositing a loud smooch on Soul’s cheek. “Good to see you, Sweetie.”

Hand still awkwardly raised, Maka watches Soul go deathly pale at the display of affection, which only cements the whole soon-to-be roadkill impression. Black Star eagerly plants himself next to Soul, very much in his personal space and squeezing right in on the same couch cushion with an air of what she can only describe as _possessive_.

Cat puns, alligators, and now… some kind of joke, surely. Please be a joke.

Maka searches Soul’s face for signs of life, and though he opens his mouth to speak, he’s too busy cringing further and further away from his roommate in an attempt to avoid the finger tracing down his cheek. After a tormented glance in Maka’s direction, Soul grits out a pained, “Hi.”

If her eyebrows could go any higher, they’d be in orbit.

“Um, Maka,” he says as Black Star’s arm slings over the back of his neck, “I--”

 _“Hubby-bunches,”_ the other man interrupts, voice low and intimate, and Maka’s hand drops back to her lap like a stone. She’s now engaged in a narrow-eyed staredown, Grunty McMooseknuckle himself glaring at her in accusation. “Who’s this?” he asks sweetly.

Despite steadily losing her grasp on this situation, Maka’s first instinct is to sneer-- if someone is going to be so blatantly hostile, the least they can do is address her directly. “I’m his neighbor,” she says with a smile so tight it could only be considered pleasant by someone who is best friends with violence. In the corner of her eye, Soul’s expression withers into something akin to spiritual suffering. Black Star, however, doesn’t bat an eyelash. She asks, “Who’re _you?_ ”

Because she knows who he is -- but knows only as much as she’d gathered in harrowing Pilates classes and what Soul has told her in passing: he’s the Farmville-exploiting, cat-punning, lightning-pantsed roommate with a pet alligator. Except the look on Soul’s face says Black Star is, despite everything, not so simply defined.

When the man replies with, “His **husband** ,” the jigsaw-shaped hole made by Soul’s history of skittish behavior is filled. The puzzle is complete, and she’s either been seeing romantic signals he hadn’t been giving in the first place, or that nest of sofa-sleeper she’d seen the first time she came here had actually been a sign of marital strife and she’s on the verge of being a homewrecker--

Maka nearly chokes on her tongue. She hates cheaters.

She exchanges a glance with Soul all of two seconds before she bolts to her feet. “I should not be here,” she says, because she is in dire need of escaping this apartment and regrouping her scattered wits.

With a hand planted in the center of Black Star’s face, Soul pushes his apparent-husband away. “Maka, wait--”

“I can see myself out,” she blurts, voice three steps higher with panic as she makes a hurried side-step around the coffee table. But her luck has taken a permanent leave of absence-- something shifts underfoot, and Maka once more meets the floor, her descent announced by an affronted howl from Blair.

The cat scrabbles from under her, climbing up Black Star’s legs and into his lap. “Jesus, are you okay?” Soul asks, standing with a hand outstretched as if to help. Face burning, Maka stumbles back to her feet.

“Is _she_ okay? She stepped on our cat!” Black Star picks up the poor animal by her armpits. “Look at her, she’s traumatized.”

Scowling over his shoulder, Soul says, “Nothing is traumatic after living with you, shut up for five seconds,” and then to her, imploring, “You don’t have to go-- give me a minute to explain?”

On top of the embarrassment, she’s also tempted to not give him another second of her life, as she can’t help but recall all the times he’s left her hanging mid-conversation. But the earnest expression he gives when he says, “Please,” eats through her resolve.

She gives him a grudging, **“One** minute.”

He looks hopeful for half a beat before becoming even more harried than before. Whipping back again to his roommate, Soul starts an urgent game of charades with his face, to which Black Star gestures with the cat’s paws in lieu of his own hands.

“...Fifty seconds,” Maka says, bemused.

More paw-waving occurs, and then Soul answers an unheard question with, “Listen, I wanna trust her with this.”

Even though she doesn’t know what that the _hell_ that means, the blatant skepticism on Black Star’s face offends her on principle.

“She’s kept your stupid alligator a secret,” Soul adds.

Black Star begins petting the cat in his lap like some supervillain. “How dare you talk about our child that way. Also, you’re the paranoid one here, but _you_ wanna spill?”

“Spill what?” Maka asks, only for Black Star to rudely hold up a hand.

“Silence, pleb, Mommy and Daddy are having a discussion.”

Exasperated isn’t strong enough to describe her at present. “ _Thirty seconds_ ,” she hisses.

Soul groans. “ **YES,** okay? Yes. I wanna tell her.”

“You’d risk that? For--” And then Black Star points a disparaging thumb in Maka’s direction.

If he wasn’t holding a semi-innocent cat, she’d consider throwing her boot at him. “Will at least one of you stop talking about me as if I’m not standing here or can I just go?”

 _“I still have fifteen seconds,”_ Soul shoots back before turning to his roommate and squaring his shoulders enough to nearly be standing up _straight._ “If we’re found out,” he says, serious as a semester final, “it’s on me. I’ll deal with all of it, including your half.”

After a long moment of doubtful eyebrows, Black Star appears to come to some kind of conclusion. “Alright.” He then picks up Blair and drapes her around the back of his neck like a furry shawl. “Carry on,” he says, the over-protective husband aura evaporating to leave behind just average levels of Bizarre. Addressing Maka, he blandly adds, “I hope you’re as cool as he thinks you are.”

“I still don’t know what’s going on but I’ve decided everything that comes out of your mouth makes me want to end your life.”

 _“Chill,”_ Soul sighs at both of them. “Okay. So...” He takes a breath. Gently gesturing with his hands as if to soften the blow of whatever he’s about to tell her, he says, “We’re not actually gay.”

“Speak for yourself,” Black Star scoffs from the couch, flinging his feet up on the coffee table.

“We’re not gay _together_ ,” Soul amends with an eyeroll. “We’re not together at all.”

Her voice comes out a lot shriller than she’d like. “ _Could’ve fooled me._ ” Maka glances at the spread fingers of his left hand, but his ring finger is empty. Looking him dead in the eye, she asks, “Are you married or not?”

His shoulders hitch up with the direct eye contact, but he manages to keep it. “Technically... yes.”

“Then--”

“But it’s not real.”

 _“How dare you,”_ Black Star chimes in from the couch.

Soul whips around to say, “You are _not helping,_ ” before turning back to her and adding, “We did it for the scholarship benefits.”

Whatever possible excuses Maka had imagined, that certainly hadn’t been one of them. Her head tilts to the side; maybe a new angle will help her spy the insincerity. “Excuse me?”

“...It’s complicated.” Soul’s eyes shoot to his roommate (husband? fake husband?) for a moment, as if he’s worried Black Star will have something asinine to contribute. “If you’re married, you can get designated as independent earlier on your FAFSA. Then being unemployed, and having someone to mark as being a dependent on top of that…”

Apparently he’s looked further into the loopholes of federal financial aid than she’s ever dreamed of. It’s kind of impressive. Also seems totally illegal.

Maka looks to Black Star for confirmation. He merely wraps Blair’s tail more securely around his neck, the cat purring happily. “The steep price of knowledge,” he says sagely. Then, to his husband, “Man, seeing _you_ let the cat out of the bag is hella surreal. Somebody’s thirsty.”           

“ **That’s** \--” Soul starts, catching Maka’s eye and desperately holding it ransom. “That’s _not_ what this is about.”

Why is it, out of this entire ridiculous conversation, that _that_ seems like the lie? Had she truly been reading too deeply into their friendship? Sure, nothing had really happened between her and Soul, but her morals and standards shouldn’t feel this compromised.

Regardless of his intentions, he’d still lied-- or deliberately withheld information, whatever-- and if she’s learned one thing about relationships, it’s that dishonestly spells disaster. “Is this why you wouldn’t add me on Facebook?”

He blinks, caught off-guard. “I really _didn’t_ see it,” he answers. But then he hunches over just a notch further, biting his lip. “Though if I had… I wouldn’t have accepted it.”

She doesn’t get it. She doesn’t understand _any_ of this. She should be grateful for the honesty, but at the moment there’s a bowling-ball-sized lump in her throat and she wants to punch someone. A couple of someones-- ‘couple’ now a word that makes everything that much worse. She hopes her voice doesn’t sound as strained as it feels when she quietly replies, “Okay. Minute’s up. I’m going home.”

“Weak,” Black Star says, one hand reaching towards the floor as he tries to lure his alligator up to the couch without deigning to help-- nevermind that the reptile’s legs are clearly too short to do it on her own. Maka turns away and makes for the door, her teeth grinding to dust.

“Let me walk you back,” Soul says just as her hand reaches the doorknob.

Looking over her shoulder, she finds that his gaze puts her under a microscope. “I literally live across the parking lot.”

“I know, but…” He nods vaguely towards the couch.

It’s only because she’s so desperate to leave that she gives in. “Yeah, alright, whatever,” she says in a huff, hurrying out the door. She wants some time alone to _think_ , but at least leaving the den of reptiles takes care of fifty percent of the problem.

Soul leads the way, dragging his feet as they go down the stairs. She would deeply appreciate it if he would _not_ , as he’s only prolonging the awkward atmosphere. When they reach the bottom of the flight, he stops to turn around, finally saying, “I was going to tell you.”

She flatly replies, “But you didn’t.” Her manic levels of confusion have shifted to something disappointed and _angry._ “I guess it just, what, slipped your mind?”

He shifts from one foot to the other in a visible attempt to not cringe. His hands slide into his pockets. “It was hard to bring up-- if anyone reports us, we’re both up student loan creek-- but I didn’t mean for you to find out this way. I’m sorry.” The slow crawl to her apartment resumes, the two of them shuffling across the pavement to the next section of the building.

Of course he hadn’t mean for her to find out like that-- the stricken horror on his face earlier had been indication, enough. Still, there’s a nagging part of her that wonders if he’d meant for her to find out at all. The age-old question that’s lain dormant in the back of Maka’s mind since her parents’ divorce rears it’s ugly head: Is he really sorry, or just sorry to have been caught?

She takes a deep breath and says the only thing she’s actually sure about. “You know, I was starting to like you.” And she thinks that’s why she feels so angry-- she’d gotten her hopes up. She _knew better than this!_

Soul stops for moment. Says, “Yeah,” as if that’s any kind of response. Keeps walking. “Possibly losing the scholarship wasn’t, um, the only reason I didn’t tell you.” He sighs, stopping at the bottom of her stairs while she passes him and walks up to her door. “At that slam-thing, when you said you couldn’t stand cheaters? I -- well, anyway. This is definitely my fault.”

Her head is spinning. Keys in sweating hand, she’s caught between wanting to see what kind of expression he’s wearing (because had that been a kind-of confession? Or not??) and unlocking her door because she doesn’t want to see his face for another second.

He says, “So, there’s no way this can work?”

She is almost home free-- anything more than this is just stalling.

“...This?” she asks, both stalling _and_ looking back at him despite herself.

The high points of his cheeks flush just a bit. “You and me.”

Maka shies away, leaning closer to her door. “Even if your marriage is a sham, it’s still legally binding-- I’m not gonna be the _other person,_ Soul.”

“But it’s not--” He cuts himself off with a frustrated noise in the back of his throat, hands coming out of his pockets to rub at his face. “I mean, besides being fake, it’s not like it’s permanent either.” Soul then hazards some quick glances in either direction, a gesture that reminds her instantly and too much of someone looking to keep a dirty secret, someone who had lied to Mama; it makes her stomach turn. He takes a couple steps up the stairs and says in a hushed voice, “I just have to keep it up until the end of the semester, and then I can finally get divorced and...”

He trails off into silence, hands slowly, cautiously sliding down the guardrails as he steps back down. “Or,” he says, hushed in a different way, reading something in her face or posture that makes him ease off, “we can just be friends, if you want. I do like hanging out with you, Maka.”

“Me too,” she says quickly, but it comes across as a token response. This whole situation has shoved her into unknown territory and put her on edge; she hates being overwhelmed and not knowing if it’s from present or past experiences. She clears her throat, though the effort feels futile against the lump that’s still taking residence there. “Really. I did too,” she says, offering a sincere smile, which he echoes back. “...But, I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

After the attempts to explain and apologize, she half-expects him to put forth a little bit more of an effort, but he merely accepts the dismissal. “Okay,” he says.

“You lied, and I’m not okay with that.”

“I understand.” His smile is kind as his eyes drift down to stick to the pavement. “I’ll leave you alone.” He takes a few more steps back, gives a small wave, and turns around to walk away.

She’s lived her life by absolutes, and she doesn’t think she’s _wrong_ , but for some reason regret makes her chest give a painful twinge.

* * *

 

It’s hard to know how good something is until you don’t have it anymore. Her routine is much the same, though she has switched to a different Pilates class to avoid certain _husbands;_ she attends lectures, works, works out. Comes up empty-handed for the reply to Mama’s letter. Rinse and repeat.

Soul has kept his distance, and she’s let him, though there’ve been some close calls on her part. Maka had found herself unthinkingly heading towards library the following week, forgetting it was open mic again. A glimpse of silver hair from the doorway had reminded her whose haunt it really was, and she made a quick escape.

The reflex to wave when she sees him at the mailboxes is still strong, but after being the one who’d cut him off, she can’t exactly jerk him around. When she spots Soul sorting through his catalogues and dropping the extras in her slot, Maka gets out of her car and sneaks out of sight, retreating to her unit without comment.

But even Maka Albarn makes mistakes: the first being reading textbooks on her phone while walking to save time. The second is attempting the first with the screen brightness turned down to save her battery. She’s become the worst kind of pedestrian.

The Incident isn’t entirely her fault -- he was staring at his shoes too -- but the outcome is a head-on collision resulting in Maka predictably meeting the ground with her ass. She’s starting to think she should just stay here.

“Geeze, sorry ‘bout th-- Oh.” Soul rubs his shoulder, which she’d brutally nailed with her forehead, his shocked face scrambling to find something vaguely neutral to wear as he regards her. “You okay?” he asks, reaching a hand down.

She makes a half-hearted effort to say ‘yeah’, but it comes out as a garbled noise of sour resignation. Maka dismisses the hand, opting to leverage herself up on her own; she’s gotta save face somehow. Unfortunately it’s an ungainly enough move with a freshly twisted ankle to cancel out any chance of piecing together her broken pride. It doesn’t help that Soul hovers like she’s going to trip again at any second-- it’s her reputation, now.

“You really oughtta watch where you’re going,” he says. An instinctive hand reaches to dust off her shoulders, but he catches himself before it can land.

It takes two to tango, and dancing around awkward topics is their specialty. “Maybe _you_ should try watching where _you’re_ going.” Okay, that came out childish, but Maka is in possession of a bruised ego and a throbbing ankle.

“Well, if you’re okay, then--”

She nearly spits, “How’ve you been doing?”

“...Pardon?”

He’d been about to walk back out of her life again, because that’s what she’d wanted, but now it _isn’t_ what she wants and it is maddening; she’d blurted it without a single thought. She’s bored, she’s lonely, and she’s going through withdrawals over a lack of good-morning cat Snapchats. “I asked how’ve you been doing,” she repeats.

“Um.” Soul’s arms interlock firmly across his chest. “I’ve been okay. You?”

It’s now or never. Okay, it could maybe not be never, but if they go back to avoiding each other it could be awhile before she has another opportunity like this again. “Kinda been wishing I could hang out with you.”

If he’s happy to hear it, he certainly doesn’t show it. With a shrug of his shoulders, Soul rolls his eyes skyward like a dog that’s been caught chewing a shoe. “I mean, you could. You’re the one who said you didn’t want to.”

Sure, blame it all on her. Not like he wasn’t the one to mislead her into thinking he was available and getting her hopes up… by not actually making any outright date invitations. Shit. Time for a graceless subject change. “I hope your pets are doing alright.”

“They’re fine, thank you,” he says, haltingly.

“Okay. Well. See you.”

Maka turns stiffly on one heel. Reconnecting had not gone according to her daydreams at all; it’s best to abort the mission before she crashes and burns. Unfortunately, her foot has other plans. She falters, wobbles, pauses.

“Twist your ankle?”

Only an asshole would state the obvious -- one who dares to notice and care _._ Ugh, she’s being so contrary she’s annoying _herself._ “I’m fine.”

She has her back turned to him, but with the skepticism dripping from his voice she can picture the combination eyeroll and brow-raise. “You walking all the way home?” Soul asks.

“What an astute observation.”

“That’s quite a ways.”

“It’s. Good. Exercise.”

He sighs, and Maka wonders how he has such enormous reserves of patience even after the demands being fake-gay-married to Black Star must have. “You already work out like five times a week, I can give you a ride.”

Considering they live in the same apartment complex, she can’t tell him it’s out of his way. Alternatively, claiming she would rather not take up his offer would simply be a straight-up lie, so she would very much like if she stopped trying to immediately find ways to get out of this. The short drive could be a take-two at redemption, but she still has yet to parse out how to say _‘Hey, I’m still mad at you for lying but also lowkey regretting possibly making an unfair ultimatum,’_ and she’s being a coward about it, which makes her even more agitated.

There’s no way any of that’s coming out, so instead she just asks, “Where are you parked?”

“Edge of campus -- Didn’t wanna pay for parking,” Soul answers, continuing his slow shuffle down the block.

Maka shakes her foot and, putting her best injury advice to the test, proceeds to walk it off. As expected, the twinge fades in moments -- she totally _could_ have walked home -- but there’s no benefit to backing out now if she seriously wants to get her friend back.

Walking through the lot, it occurs to her that she has no idea what Soul drives-- considering he felt it necessary to marry a caricature straight out of a nightmare bachelor party for the financial benefits, she should probably lower her expectations somewhere near zero. But then he stops next to a motorcycle that goes beyond ‘pleasant surprise’ and straight into ‘which bank was robbed to afford this?’

It slips out before she can stop herself. “Nice bike, Top Gun.”

“Hey now, she’s the only joy in my life.” He bristles, swinging a leg over. “Are you going to get on or what?”

She’d feel worse if he sounded less like a disgruntled possum that just got evicted from its favorite dumpster. “Got a helmet?”    

“Nooope, left it by the door when I was leaving this morning.” So he’s clearly planning on riding without one whether she’s on the back of the bike or not. Soul does seem to sense her hesitation, though. “Don’t worry, it’s not that far.”

Maka blurts, “When did _‘quite a ways’_ become _‘not that far?’”_  

“I’ll go **extra slow** , like one of those motorized wheelchairs in the grocery store,” he adds, a last offer in the safety barter.   

Well, it would be something exciting to write her mom about, though Maka isn’t sure how approving she’d be. However, it would _really_ piss off her dad…

Sold to the highest bidder. “Alright,” she says, clambering on the back.  

With no good options for holding on, Maka fastens her hands to Soul’s shoulders. It’s the most platonic place she can think of, but the word ‘homewrecker’ runs on repeat in her head when they roll away from the curb. True to his promise, Soul keeps it well below the residential speed limit, going slow enough that she’s almost tempted to tell him he could speed up just _a_ _little._

Going ten miles per hour for fear of getting hurt feels like an excessively apt metaphor for her life, come to think of it.

There’s little in the way of road or wind noise to disguise the awkward silence. They do make it back to the apartment complex in one piece, though, which she guesses was the goal. Another day of survival: complete. She climbs off and stretches her legs.

“That slow enough for you?” Soul asks.

He makes it sound like _she’s_ the killjoy grandma between them. He’s probably not wrong. “Plenty,” Maka answers. His hands are shoved to the depths of his pockets in a gesture that wouldn’t seem expectant if it were anyone else. She tilts her chin down and adds, “Thanks for the ride.”

“Don’t mention it.” A shrug. He finally gets off the bike. “I _did_ knock you over.”

“Yeah. Well, I was at fault too, so.”

“You'll be fine going up the stairs?”

She nods, frustrated that a simple question from him, one that anyone would say in his place, leaves her so hopeful.

“I guess I’ll see you around then.” He waves a hand, perfunctory, and heads off to his own apartment. It’s abrupt and ambiguous, but at least it’s not so definitive as the last time they’d parted ways.

 


	2. Chapter 2

She’s not still trying to _avoid_ him, it’s that the habit of checking the window to see if he’s at the mailboxes before she goes to check hers becomes something more like ritual-- except the relief that the coast is clear has been exchanged for disappointment.

Today is no different: there are no shark slippers making an appearance. Maka trudges out of her apartment to retrieve her bills.

She’s fishing her mail key out of her pocket when a voice behind her chimes with, “You look like a strong-bodied young lady.” She freezes. Turns to see a young man with a smile out of an Invisalign™ commercial. He looks somewhat familiar-- maybe someone she’s had a class with but never contributed enough in discussions for her to take notice? He’s certainly being forward enough now.

“Can I help you?” she asks, though she isn’t enthused about helping an unknown man who’d just described her like a cup of coffee.

He gestures to a couple boxes in the trunk of his car. “Just trying to bring some family heirlooms to my brother. Maybe you know him.”

Maka squints. There’s another guy with him who’s holding nothing but a filofax, but he looks completely disinclined to do any heavy lifting. “I might,” she cautiously answers. Neither one of them offers any further information, which only confounds her more. Mega-watt keeps smiling and glancing between her and the boxes.

She sighs, resigned to fate and willing to get this over with fast. “You need help carrying those in?”

“That would be smashing.”

Maybe Nigel Thornberry had walked off-screen, gotten a nose job, and waltzed into her life. At no point on their short walk does the man or his silent shadow introduce themselves, the former deigning only to yammer about overdue wedding gifts and how maybe he should ‘tie it down’ too. Then things start really going downhill.

Their destination, against all her fervent prayers, appears to be an apartment Maka had been rather familiar with up until recently, and the wheels in her head frenetically turn, piecing together where she’s seen this magnanimous stranger before. It’s too late by the time they reach the the bottom of Soul’s stairs; she’s blocked in with nowhere to run unless she wants to fling herself over the railing and make a break for it. Which is tempting, to be honest. It’s not even that Maka doesn’t want to see Soul, but she’s just not mentally prepared.

Once Soul's brother reaches around her to knock on the door, Maka’s spirit departs her body at the sound of the deadbolt unlocking.

* * *

 

Things had still been tense the last time they’d spoken, so Maka on his doorstep carrying a box big enough to house a significant portion of Black Star’s yoga pants collection is not what he’d been expecting, yet there she is, fish-eyed on the other side of the peep hole. Even if they hadn’t recently started talking to each other again, it’s not like he would leave her hanging outside-- not if she’s looking _that_ distressed. Maybe this will help make amends for his ever-lengthening chain of fuckups.

He opens the door, channeling all that is cool and natural. “Hey, Maka.” His fingers reflexively clench the front of his jeans, twitchy with nervous energy. “What’s with the box--”

His neighbor looks like she’s seen a ghost, or hell itself-- and then, like some demented jack-in-the-box, his brother pops out from behind Maka with a maniacal grin. “Bro!”

“Oh,” he blurts, “it’s just Satan, in person.” Soul frantically shuts the door, but a single patent-leather shoe wedges itself in the gap like an expensive horror movie.

“Don’t be like that, kiddo,” Wes says.  
  
“Uuuugggggh--”  
  
“Just let your handsome and successful big brother inside; I have a wedding present!”

“The wedding was a year and a half ago,” Soul grits out, hissing when Wes’s manicured fingers slither between the gap as well. “We’re not interested.”

At least this explains the comically-large box that Wes has somehow harangued Maka into carrying up the stairs like a pack mule when he has a perfectly good, paid assistant. 

The foot only wiggles further in, taking advantage of Soul’s unwillingness to actually break his brother’s various appendages. With narrow-eyed annoyance that is carbon-copied from their mother, Wes says, “It took me a while to figure out your new address. Your Facebook is absolutely unhelpful for anyone who wants to stalk you.”

Now that Wes knows where he lives again, he will undoubtedly make it a habit to randomly drop in and nag him to death and steal all the cereal. “I am deeply sorry to have inconvenienced your creepiness.” No matter how Soul hides, his brother will be at the door like Jack Nicholson ala The Shining, announcing ‘Heeeere’s this new concealer I’m sponsoring I think it would really help your dark circles.’

With a defeated sigh, Soul gives in to the inevitable and opens the door. Maybe the faster he lets Wes in, the faster he can get this over with.

Maka enters first, deliberately setting the box on the coffee table and whirling around. He can see she’s ready to make a beeline back out of ground zero. “I’m just gonna go--”

“Oh, no, you _have_ to let me thank you for helping with that.” Wes steers her back into the center of the room.

“Really, it’s no trouble, I’d hate to impose--”

“And I can introduce you to my brother. Soul, have you met this young lady yet?”

“Actually, we already--” Soul starts.

There’s no chance. His brother steamrolls straight over him in a long-time habit of setting Soul up with every person Wes comes across. Apparently being married, albeit insincerely, hasn’t broken that pattern.

“She seems like just the kind of girl you should be hanging out with,” Wes says, as if Soul hasn’t been thinking the exact same thing for the past few weeks.

Soul rubs his temples; a headache has arrived in full force. “Wes, we already know each other.” He shoots a look at Wes’s assistant, Harvar, looking for some help at wrangling his brother in or, preferably, out of his apartment-- or hell, maybe just some solidarity. The man merely stands, unimpressed, toes to the threshold in the open doorway with his arms crossed over the planner at his chest

“Oh, then you’ll have to introduce me.” Wes perches on the couch, artfully propping a leg up in a practiced talk-show pose. “And your husband, where is he? I have yet to meet him since you went off and _eloped._ ”

Soul’s extended, full-body cringe is an album that has gone platinum three times; he could go without more reminders regarding the disaster of his personal life, especially with Maka in attendance. “Not here.”  

“Well where is he?”

“I dunno.”

Wes slaps his hands down on the coffee table. “How can you not know? How do you live like this? I saw your honeymoon photos, and they were all just Bart on the Disney World rides without you.”

“Don’t call him that.” Best to nip that in the bud while he has the chance, lest they ever meet-- wait. “Actually, _do_. Maybe he’ll legdrop you through the floor. Anyway, the hotel had air conditioning, why would I leave?”

“You can’t just let your life pass you by,” he says, sounding like every wistful ballad ever heard on the radio. “You’re married now, enjoy it!”

“Your mouth saying ’enjoy’ and ‘married’ in the same sentence may be the actual funniest thing I’ve ever heard,” Soul flatlines.

Harvar clears his throat from the doorway, the closest thing to a laugh anyone will hear from him for the next fifteen years.

“In any case, I would enjoy things a lot more if you would quit fuckin’ meddling in my social life.” His current objective on the road to peace and happiness is, presently, to get his brother and the assistant the hell out of his apartment. Maka clearly wants an escape, but Harvar is doing a great impression of a stoic brick wall.

Wes waves a hand, dismissive. “I can’t help it, I just want you to be happy.” He’s more focused on unboxing Soul’s own present. “Anyway, I came over to bring you these.” A pair of plates appear in his hands. “Since you went and got hitched first, I figured you should have the family china. I have all my wild years ahead of me still, after all.”

As living with Black Star can also be described as ‘wild’, Soul doubts the set of dishes will last the term. After the first set of breakables, he’d instilled a child-proof dishes rule, especially considering how his roommate unceremoniously climbs on the counters to reach the higher shelves. “What am I supposed to do with these?” he asks, taking the plates from his brother and stowing them safely back in the box. _“I’m in college.”_

“Have dinner parties? I don’t know -- whatever married people do.” Surely he must be doing this for some sick form of entertainment, but Wes is a performer by nature and his poker face is impeccable. “Figure it out, I’m not taking them back.”

“I will put these back in your stupid overpriced car, myself. Also, apologize to Maka for making her your mule.”

Down the hall, a cacophonous splash spills from the bathroom. It’s a sound Soul has gotten used to: Snappy clumsily scaling a step ladder into the bathtub that has effectively become her personal swimming pool. If Harvar is surprised in the slightest, he doesn’t show it, but Wes and Maka both startle.

“What was that?” Wes asks, craning his neck and trotting towards the bathroom like the over-curious beast of nightmare he is.  

A close encounter of the reptilian kind is the opposite of getting him out of the apartment, and Soul cuts his brother off before he can make it there. “Nothing -- cat must’ve knocked something in the shitter,” he lies as fast as he can.

Maka at least realizes the gravity of the situation, bless her big brain, and is willing to act as his support. Announcing, “I’ll check on it,” she makes a show of checking the bathroom before very firmly closing the door. “Yep. Just soap. In the sh--toilet.” Her voice shakes, eyes as round as those stupid dinner plates, but Wes seems to buy it, or at least becomes disinterested enough to consider the situation boring.

His brother dusts off his hands as if he’d been the one who carried the box of china in the first place. “Well, I guess I’d better get going,” he says before shooting a sharp side-eye to Soul and adding, “but I would really like to have something to tell Mother about your husband.”

It’s a threat and they both know it. Soul resigns himself to somehow having to coordinate Wes and Black Star into one room long enough for them to become acquainted but not so long that they summon a catastrophic event by bringing too much Obnoxious in one place. For now though, he intends to clear the apartment so he can hyperventilate into a paper bag for a while. “Yeah we’ll have to schedule something,” he says as pleasantly as he can manage, trying his best to guide his brother out the door with his body. “Thanks for the gift, see you later, _bye Harv--”_

The assistant blandly jots something down-- probably scheduling in ‘Catastrophe; obnoxious’ for his bullet journal-- and finally vacates the doorway.

“Remember, if you don’t call me, I _do_ know where you live,” Wes chides on his way out the door. With a gratifying slam, Soul closes the door, locks it, turns the deadbolt for good measure.

“You need a new shower curtain,” Maka says, flopping on the couch and looking about as exhausted as he feels.

He takes a moment to heave a deep breath and groan at the ceiling. “Okay.” Soul walks to the bathroom. Opens the door so Snappy can mosey out and greet Maka. Does not look at the mess of tangled and shredded shower curtain floating in the tub. “Maybe me wanting to ditch that open-mic before makes more sense now? I’m sorry you got dragged in, though. Wes doesn’t really get boundaries.”

She reaches down to hesitantly pat the alligator on the head and straighten her bow. “It’s fine -- sorry you got stuck with the china.”

“Ugh, don’t remind me. I’m gonna have to store it somewhere, ‘cause you know my gran is probably gonna ask about it.” Pressing the heels of his hands into his eyelids does not, unfortunately, make the box disappear. “I don’t wanna deal with it today, I just want to nap for a year.”

Maka fidgets on the couch. “I can go…”

Shit, he hadn’t even realized how much that sounded like an impolite hint for her to leave, which is not what he wants. “Oh, no, you’re fine,” he says, reassuring. The circumstances by which Maka may have ended up in his apartment aren’t the best, but she’s here now and the tense awkwardness between them had been alleviated, however temporarily, by the whirlwind of his brother. “He’s just a piece of work.”

“Well, if you need to take the china somewhere,” she says, wry, “I can always help carry it. Your brother says I am ‘ _strong-bodied’._ ”

Considering her residency at the gym, it’s not like Wes had been wrong-- in fact, she’d probably have an easier time of it than Soul attempting to carry that thing. Not that he wants to mention any of this out loud, because he has his one allocated Tiny Sliver of Pride that he needs to protect lest he lose all self-esteem. “I’m sure I can do it, thanks. Take a day off.”

Maka glances at the box on the table and says, “Okay,” measured and even. “If you’re sure,” she adds, open-ended.

He groans. “I’m not gonna ask you to carry my ‘wedding gift’, geeze.” He watches her lips twitch in something that might be be a smile, but it’s too brief to be certain. With a grumble, he sets his sliver free and says, “And, I’ll be honest: since it’s now legally half Black Star’s, I’m just gonna make him carry it.”

“Pfft. I see.” Her gaze lands somewhere over his shoulder, or maybe around his chin. He shuffles from foot to foot, eyeing the couch; he’s tempted to sit down but is wary of her boundaries-- he thinks he’d pushed them after she found out about him and Black Star, and he would do a lot of things to never see her cringe like that again. In any case, she gets to her feet before he can move. “I still need to get my mail, I got caught up in a detour.”

“Right. Wes is good at that,” Soul says, moving out of the way as to not pull a Harvar impression between her and freedom. “He’s reached a level of fame where he thinks he can just get unsuspecting people to do his bidding. Thanks for helping him out. Sorry.”

As Maka makes her way around the coffee table, her eyes flit to the box of heirloom dishes. Strangely, she comes to a stop next to it, considering his wedding gift for a long moment before saying, “I’m sorry too.”

Then her attention hones in on _him,_ and there’s enough purpose in her gaze to nail him in place. Has another fuckup occurred completely without his knowledge? “What?” he asks, hopelessly confused.

Though her ears are turning a little red, she’s straightforward as she bluntly asks, “You wanna hang out sometime?”

That’s not what he’d expected, but at least it doesn’t _sound_ like she’s angry. In fact, it might actually sound positive?  “Y-yeah, if you’re okay with it, sure.” Positive enough to even warrant texting her again? Trying not to sound too hopeful, he says, “Maybe this weekend, we could--”

“Wait.” She cuts him off with a palm in the air-- not unlike something Black Star would do, but mentioning this is probably not in his best interests. “Um. I know I’ve made things… difficult, but. I have one request, first.”

He’s not clear on what she means by difficult, or why she’d have to apologize for anything-- hadn’t it been all of _his_ issues that complicated things between them? He shrugs. “Name it.”

Tilting up her chin with challenge, she says, “Accept my friend request on Facebook.”

He thinks he can _feel_ the blood draining from his face. After the falling-out between them, Soul had logged into his account and guiltily found the notification, ignored and unattended, but he hadn’t been able to do anything about it, after the fact. “...Yeah, alright. I can do that,” he agrees between grit teeth.

Maka nods, appeased and resolute. He shuffles behind her as she heads for the door, waves her off with a mutual promise to text each other for the weekend, and shuts the door behind her. He then proceeds to melt to the floor.

The sheer amount of horrifying kissy photos on his Facebook account is enough for him to wish himself into a grave.

* * *

 

Ideally, his first text should be the perfect combination of non-threatening, friendly, and inviting, with a dash of sincerity for good measure. Several days trying to figure out how the heck to pull that off in one text has led him here, lying in (couch)bed, and blearily deciphering a tilted incoming message because his phone has made the executive decision to rotate everything.

Once his brain catches up with his eyes, he scrambles upright. He hadn’t expected Maka would text first-- at least not so soon.

_[[i have a favor to ask.]]_

Now wide awake, Soul eagerly replies, but her response leaves him wanting to crawl back under the blankets and become a couch hermit.

_[[can i meet with your brother?]]_

He supposes he should feel relieved that she hadn’t brought up the honeymoon photos. Still, this might actually be a worse topic; he’s tempted to straight-up deny he even has a brother and pray Maka somehow forgets having been Wes’s pack mule.

He tentatively replies, _[[what for?]]_

Maka explains that she has an assignment to interview an alum for the paper, and that she wanted to try her luck with him before calling up strangers in the directory. But no pressure.

Soul rolls onto his back with a groan. It really would be the perfect situation; Maka needs an interview and Wes loves giving them-- maybe even more than he enjoys performing. He knows his brother will agree the second he asks, but he’s wary to send his neighbor off alone. Wes can be vicious, and letting the two of them meet without Soul being there would result in having all of his tween secrets and childhood recital videos spilled.

Even while thinking about all the things that can (and probably will) go wrong, he finds himself texting that he’s sure he can figure something out. Sends, and promptly regrets every life choice that has led to this moment.

This is fine. He can make this work. Wes is thrilled, of course, though Soul isn’t sure if he’s pleased to be in the school newspaper or to just have the opportunity to conduct some sneaky research of his own. Nothing in life is certain except death and meddling older brothers.

 _[[I’m free today!]]_ Wes replies. Of course he is.

He gives both Maka and Wes the address of a shitty cafe some distance from the apartment. The last thing he needs is a Starbucks stampede crowding around Wes and finding out where Soul lives to hold stalking stakeouts for a chance to see the superstar.

The last step is to arrive twenty minutes early to ensure that at no point should Maka and Wes be alone without him, and therefore no unauthorized childhood story time can ruin him.

Riding over to the cafe, Soul orders a mocha with enough chocolate to hopefully cover the burnt coffee flavor numerous Yelp users have warned about. It kind-of works. Maka perpetually-early Albarn arrives second, toting a laptop, notebook, and small recording device.

He waves her over before she has a chance to order. “The coffee here tastes like ass,” Soul says in greeting.

“Why were you so specific about this place then?” Maka hisses, looking over her shoulder to see if the employees had overheard him.

“Because the coffee tastes like ass -- should be quiet for your interview. No groupies.”

Comprehension dawns on her face; she’s remembered what they’re here for. “Thanks for this, by the way,” she says, tucking a bit of hair behind an ear and averting her eyes before emptying her bag, covering the table with enough office supplies to make Staples feel uneasy.

“No problem,” he manages to say through an internal screaming chorus of 'weirdly cute **_nerd alert'_**. Soul takes a sip of his coffee just to have something to distract himself while they wait for he-who-keeps-no-schedule.

Against all odds-- or more likely due to his assistant’s efforts-- Wes shows up relatively on time, sliding next to Soul in the booth. Harvar, with customary planner in hand, surveys his options before perching on the edge of Maka’s bench with his knees turned out as if he’s magnetically repulsed by the pleather seats.

Wes flips open a menu and stifles a laugh. “Look, Havarti, it’s you.” He turns the menu around like a kid showing off their macaroni painting from kindergarten, though Harvar looks anything but a proud parent. Soul can sense the eyeroll behind those dark sunglasses. “So…” Wes continues, tossing the menu aside.

 _“Maka,”_ Soul fills in when he realizes Wes is fishing for a name.

“Maka, my brother tells me you’d like an interview for the university paper. That’s so exciting -- it’s been so long since they’ve contacted me for that nice alum spotlight section.”

Her eyebrows crinkle. “Actually--”

Soul clears his throat and kicks her under the table.

 _“What?_ ” Maka angrily mouths across the table.

Does he really have to spell it out for her? Just because Maka’s writing for what she describes as the worst section of the paper doesn’t mean Wes has to know that. Soul takes the silent route and tries to test his luck with telepathy. She squints but thankfully doesn’t take another stab at bursting their resident diva’s bubble.

“Okay, well, are you getting anything or shall we start right in?” Maka asks, arranging her supplies as fastidiously as possible on the sticky table.

“I might need one of those Havarti breakfast sandwiches.” Wes shoots a commercial-ready smile towards his assistant and receives nothing in return. It’s not totally clear if he really does want a sandwich, or just wants to make jokes at Harvar’s expense, but the following silence is long and uncomfortable for all parties involved until Wes says, “Let’s just get started.”

“Great--” Maka starts, but she’s not the one really running this interview.

Wes pulls out a stash of notecards from his pocket, shifting from grinning punmaster to music/modeling/beauty business guru in under three seconds. “I’ve prepared some statements if you’d like to start recording and put them on the record.” There’s a reason his brother is so successful, and it’s only half because he’s devastatingly talented.

Maka is too surprised to do anything but say, “Okay,” and turn on her recording device. Shaking her head, she quickly regains her footing while Wes is halfway through a spiel on how much the head of the music department helped shape him as a professional. There’s only a small moment of opportunity when Wes stops to breathe, and Maka takes it. “So what do you think about the new treasurer appointment?” she squeezes in.

He doesn’t miss a beat. Lets her question roll off his back like water, taking it only as a topic suggestion. “You know, funding the arts is really important at all levels of schooling, I mean, where would I be if not for the encouragement of my earliest teachers?”

“Um.” Maka’s floundering, but there isn’t much Soul can do about it without snapping at his brother to answer her damn questions. Harvar lays a napkin on the table before setting his elbow atop it so he can prop his chin and continue to look disinterested in reality without having to directly touch anything. “I really wanted to ask about your opinions on the 2017 budget report?”

The issue at hand is that this article assignment is primarily bullshit and that no one on earth actually has anything useful to say about budget reports other than the people who make them.

“Well, when I was a student I always figured they should refurbish the performance hall.” Wes prepares another anecdote. “Once during a recital, I swear one of the flutes was so shrill that a tile fell from the ceiling.”

Soul has heard that one before, among other increasingly grand tales with questionable validity. He slouches in the bench seat, preparing for the long haul. Maka tries to pin down actual answers from Wes, but is only rewarded with ones shaped for a profile piece on his career.

“Reminder that you have a hair appointment in twenty minutes.” Harvar cuts Wes off mid-sentence with mechanical timeliness.

“Oh, yes, look at the time.” Wes looks at his wrist, but finds no watch. Grabs his assistant’s instead to confirm the hour, who nearly faceplants without the support under his chin. Even with sunglasses, Harvar’s withering glare is enough to melt the polar ice caps, but Wes seems to have developed an immunity. “It’s a good thing this wasn’t a video interview -- I’ve got to get this mop managed.” He toys with the ends of hair that has clearly seen scissors recently.

Soul sighs. Leave it to his brother to make the rest of the world self conscious just by existing. “Yeah, looks like you really need it.”

“You know, I could get you in with my stylist one of these days.”

The two of them are related enough without getting identical haircuts. Soul only has to look back at old Christmas photos to relive that hell. “I think I’m good, thanks.”

Right on cue, here comes the look that says unsolicited life advice is incoming. Thankfully, it’s Maka who speaks before Wes can say anything. “Well, thanks for your time,” she says weakly, glancing over her notes. Soul knows there isn’t anything useful in there, and the recording won’t be much better, but his neighbor is valiantly professional.  

“Oh course, Maka. Anything for a friend of my brother’s.” Wes starts to slide out of the booth, but not without saying to Soul, “I’m still expecting a dinner invite so I can meet your husband.”

It’s the same threat; different day, but there’s an unsettling, almost imperceptible message coming through, as if Wes Evans had perfected the Withering Glare to such an exemplary degree that for all intents looks like genuine congeniality: ‘ _Consider taking me seriously soon or you will see me get serious_.’

This must be how his brother became so impervious to his assistant’s open disdain. Brief but potent, Soul feels icy terror grip his spine. “Yeah, totally,” he replies with a smile, though they both know who wins the Fake Awards right now.

The pair is hardly out the door and out of view when Maka melts onto the table, careless of the coffee stains and post-its in her path. Soul can relate-- the impending doom is real. “So, on a scale of one to ten, how useless is the material you got?” he asks.

“I mean…” She props her chin up to look at him with conflicted eyes. “I can easily write an article from all of this, just not the one I’m supposed to.” She pauses to sit up and rest her chin on her hands, mashing her cheeks with her palms. The sigh she lets out withers his soul. “I just don’t know how happy my boss will be about it not fitting the assignment whatsoever.”

Soul sets his coffee down a little too hard, startling her fully upright. “Aw damn, it’s not gonna be a problem for your job is it?” He’d hate to get her yelled at because of his idiot brother.

She makes a single bark of mirthless laughter. “It’s not like there’s anywhere they can demote me to.”

“I guess…” That still doesn’t sound ideal. So much for doing her a favor. Now all of their time is wasted and she’ll probably have to start calling up old business students to get what she needs.

“After you went through all that trouble too,” Maka continues.

‘Stress’ is probably a better description. “Ehh, it’s really no big deal. I just hope you can work something out for work.” Soul flexes his fingers, clenching the fabric of his jeans. “Let me know how it goes, okay?”

Maka nods, quiet, though her silence is promptly interrupted by an unearthly stomach-growl that sounds something akin to a bullfrog. She pinks. “So does the food here taste like ass too?”

“I wouldn’t risk it. There’s a noodle place around the corner that’s half decent.”

“Good, I need some stress-carbs,” she says, and then the shop’s door dings. Soul and Maka watch in silence as Harvar reenters, goes to the counter, and places two orders of his namesake-sandwich.

* * *

 

One three a.m. night later, Maka is no closer to spinning an appropriate angle on her article. She should ask for an extension and find someone else to interview, but, sleep deprived as she is, she’s dangerously reckless and considering turning it in anyway. What’s the worst that can happen? Her editor, Kim, doesn’t run it and makes her do it over for the next issue? That’s no worse than having to redo it in the first place-- she might as well use the material she has.

She’s been sitting at her desk for far too long though; a change of scenery is in order. Maka makes a hasty effort at brushing her teeth and throws a sweater over the clothes she slept in. That one computer lab in the basement of the communications facility should be pretty empty, and maybe the lack of windows will make her feel less disappointed about missing the sunshine.

On the way out the apartment, Maka peels a notice off the door. Her heart plummets for a second, worried that the building manager had caught wind of her illicit candle burning (it’s not like she’s going to set the place on fire, they could have a little trust with the lease).

Thankfully, it’s not a cease and desist letter or an eviction notice, though it’s written as formally as one: there’s going to be a spring barbecue in the parking lot-- a potluck and ‘meet the neighbors’ sort of thing. She can’t make any sense in having a potluck at the end of the school term when many leases are about to end, but she’s not the type to pass up free ribs.

She drives to campus and sequesters herself in the corner of the computer lab to write, slowly surrounding herself with a fortress of scrapped ideas and half empty cups of lukewarm coffee. The recording of the interview plays on repeat in her ears, fueling her to concoct something decent out of this trainwreck.

The more caffeine she puts down, the more rash she gets, her fingers flying across the keyboard with grand flourishes. Maka types so murderously that her lone companion in the lab, a bespectacled young man with a permanent sneer, ups and leaves with an extra-offended look on his face. Three hours and a few tears later, she emails in a draft she’s less than proud of, but it’s finished and nothing can destroy her sense of pride. She probably won’t get a response until Monday -- Kim refuses to answer emails on weekends -- but her task is complete. Now Maka can catch up on sleep and regain some sanity before that potluck tomorrow.

Before she can sign-off the computer though, she gets a ping from her email. In the surprise move of the century, her editor has actually responded almost instantaneously. Maka waits for the message to load, mentally preparing herself for the inevitable shitstorm. But Kim’s only response is:

_‘How the fuck did you get an interview with THE Wes Evans?!’_

Maka tiredly stares at the message, brows furrowed like a trench. Just how famous is this guy? Some cursory research reveals a sizable fan base and Maka can’t believe she didn’t utilize this resource when she was trying to dig up something on Soul. Some journalist.

Now she has to decide how to respond to this email. Kim has been petty and dismissive from the moment Maka got the position, and this is the first time Maka has had the upper hand. She needs to play her cards wisely. The first step is to not respond immediately, much as it pains her to leave an email hanging. See how Kim likes a taste of her own medicine. Maka logs out and packs up her things, resisting the urge to reply on her phone.

She makes it back to her apartment without replying and by the time she does look at her phone, there’s a second email from Kim.

Re: Re: Interview Draft: _‘OMG Maka! That was so funny you did so good. I’m going to put this in the entertainment section.’_  
Re: Re: Re: Interview Draft: _‘Do you think you could get me his autograph?’_ _  
_ Re: Re: Re: Re: Interview Draft: ‘Maybe it’s time to try you out on some opinion pieces.’

Well that is not at all how Maka expected that exchange to go, especially how flippant her editor has been about her other writing samples. It’s unclear if the offer is because Kim likes her writing, or if she just wants an in with Wes. But given the lack of professionalism, Maka isn’t above milking the opportunity to get a little exposure. If positions were actually based on hard work, she’d have some qualms about taking a handout -- less so when assignments seem to be based on how much Kim likes someone’s hairstyle.

Soul will be shocked. She can’t wait to tell him! Ah, but first she should reply to Kim. Maka settles on telling her that she has a personal connection; better keep up the mystery without revealing that Wes is the brother of her neighbor with the annoying fake husband. She shoots off a reply to her editor and then pulls up Soul from her contact list.

She’s halfway through composing a text to send to him when the corner of that flyer catches her eye from her purse. She could make her announcement now, or she could do it in person, assuming he comes to the potluck. Instead of sharing the news, Maka texts to ask if Soul is coming to the barbecue tomorrow.

_[[theres a bbq?]]_

_[[yeah, in the parking lot. free ribs!]]_

He replies quickly, _[[not like its far. i wouldnt pass up free ribs anyway]]_

Her laugh is a little startling when she’s by herself, but her smile persists as she looks up recipes for potato salad.

* * *

 

Sunday rolls around and Maka is just making sure she has everything, as if she’s going somewhere more than fifty feet from her own home, but she’s interrupted by a knock at the door.

It’s a semi-familiar face she’s seen on just a couple occasions -- a cordial introduction, a friendly inspection, maybe a commando run-in at the mailbox before she found out where all her underwear was ending up. “...Mortimer, hello!” Maka shifts to one side, praying the building manager doesn’t notice her candle-littered coffee table from the doorway. “Did you need something?”

From head to toe, Mortimer is a meticulous amalgam of different shades of black with intermittent, pale breaks of what little exposed skin he shows: a very well-put-together goth, as viewed through a Burberry fashion filter. He fiddles with one of the many silver rings on his hands. “Just inquiring about the barbecue and whether or not you were attending. It’s five o’clock, but the lot is still empty. I’m making the rounds to remind people,” he explains.

“I was just on my way out,” she says, trying to nudge her way further into the entrance and hopefully block his view inside. “I’d give everyone a few minutes, they’re probably still cooking.”

“Oh.” His hands pause, as if he hadn’t considered this. “Good. My father is just on the way with the grill--”

“Your father?” Was this supposed to be a family thing, like back in the dorms? She hopes not-- Maka isn’t particularly keen on inviting her dad, mostly because he’s about as embarrassing as it gets and likes to pretend she’s still a teenager.

Mortimer crosses his arms, staring at the ground. At least he’s not peeking in her apartment anymore. “He owns the building, I just keep an eye on it for him.”

“Ah.” Well that’s a relief. Also explains why someone her age is playing the role of a glorified R.A. “Well, I have to get the food out of the fridge.”

“Yes, of course.” He steps back enough for Maka to close the door. Crisis averted.

She grabs her dish out of the fridge but waits an extra minute just in case he’s still standing out there. Once outside, she finds folding tables set up near the mailboxes. They’re neatly lined with tablecloths, and a bluetooth speaker sits on one playing music at a respectable, neighborly volume, though Maka is a little curious about _what_ exactly is playing. She sets her bowl down and considers dropping by Soul’s apartment, but it looks like their building manager has already done the job.

Soul meanders down the stairs looking disgruntled and barely awake, but that’s just business as usual. He must’ve managed to keep the alligator under wraps. She waves him over when the Mortimer hurries to tame a wind-strewn tablecloth.

“Are you bringing any food?” Maka asks under her breath.

“I guess I have, like, at least ten pounds of chicken in the fridge if the grill starts running low.”

She waits for a punchline that doesn’t appear to be coming. Coughs nervously in warning as Mortimer returns from the tables.

“So, Apartment Six,” he says, somehow so deferential that addressing someone by their door number doesn’t come across as rudely as it would had anyone else said it. “Evans, correct?”

Soul’s throat bobs and his eyes shoot between Maka and Mortimer. They’ve never been in a social situation with him before-- and it occurs to Maka that he has more to hide from the building manager than just the alligator. “Yeah, it’s Soul.”

“Will your husband be joining us today?”

Maka nearly chokes, but Soul slides right into character, answering with a casual, “I think he’ll be home soon. He went for a workout, but he knows there’s a thing today.”

“Very good. The both of you are sometimes reclusive, so I’ll be glad to know you better.” Mortimer grabs a can of sparkling water from a cooler next to the tables and pops it open, while Maka bites her tongue at the thought of Soul and Black Star _both_ pulling disappearing acts in front of the building manager.

“Sorry about that,” Soul says with a wan smile. “Both our courses keep us pretty busy.”

Mortimer solemnly nods. “No need for apology. And to be married right at the start must have been chaotic-- you must’ve really known what you wanted.”

With a humble shrug, Soul says, “Yeah… It seemed like the right move to make, though.”

He really has some lines prepared; even with context, there’s still some truth to them. If Maka hadn’t already known The Big Secret, she thinks she might have been fooled with that oddly sincere performance. His means of affording tuition is not something she would ever consider doing, herself, but with the cost of education right now, she can’t find it in herself to fault him enough to blow his cover.

And the very sober way he told Black Star _‘I trust her with this’_ is something that continues to run through her mind a lot.

This isn’t the setting she’d hoped for when she wanted to tell Soul about her good fortune with the newspaper. She had banked on there being other tenants in attendance to manage a separate, private conversation with him, free from the watching eyes of their landlord’s son. Maka shifts from foot to foot; she’s ready for some other people to come out and lighten up the atmosphere.

A car rolls into the parking lot, interrupting their awkward conversation of generic pleasantries. She’s at a loss for who it could be-- it’s pretty luxurious for any college student, even if it does seem somewhat familiar. The window rolls down and freshly trimmed platinum blonde pops out.

 _“_ Wes. What are you doing here,” Soul asks, voice weary. His eyes don’t even widen. He is a broken man.

“I came for the potluck, obviously. I brought shrimp cocktail~” Wes waves his brother off and beams at Maka instead. “Maka, dear, hope that interview worked out for you.”

It’s the opportune moment to make her announcement and maybe grab that autograph for Kim, but Soul makes another attempt at shooing his brother away before Maka can speak up. “How did you even know there was a potluck? It’s for _residents_ . You don’t _live here._ ”

“I saw the flyer on your door.”

“What flyer? I never saw one.”

“That’s because I took it when I stopped by yesterday. You weren’t home though, so I thought I’d come tonight and meet my brother-in-law.” Ignoring all of Soul’s anguish, he parks and sashays his way out of the driver’s seat, shrimp platter in hand.

“You really need to start calling ahead of time,” Soul grumbles, grabbing a piece from the plate and gnashing his teeth as aggressively as one can manage.

His brother just waves a finger in response. “That’s a trick. If I called ahead then you’d _never_ be home. I know how you are.” Glancing around, he seems to realize they’re not the only ones in the parking lot, and that Maka and Mortimer have been witnessing their whole exchange. Wes gives the apartment manager a blue-eyed once-over and flips his hair the way only a celebrity can. “So are you going to introduce me, or what?”

“You already know Maka,” Soul sighs. “You said hello to her five seconds ago.” He soothes his woes with shellfish. Wes had evidently brought an acceptable peace offering to ease the blow of his presence.    

“I know _that._ I _meant_ this other dashing gentleman.” Wes offers his hand while Maka gapes. “We can’t have met before -- I know I’d never forget a face like that. Wes Evans, a pleasure. Is that Burberry?”

Their manager tilts his head a little, like he’s spotted a rare species he’s heard of but never seen before. “I can confirm we have not met. You’re Soul’s guest, I assume?”

“His favorite brother,” Wes declares.

“Also my least favorite brother.” Soul says around a mouthful of food. “Mortimer, Wes,” he gestures. “Wes, this is Mortimer, our building manager.”  

Wes beams. “ _W_ _hat a name!_  So you must be who I should talk to about getting a spare key for my brother’s apartment.” Smile: genuine; eyelashes: fluttering in the breeze; Wes speaks with a crazed sincerity few people are capable of. Mortimer’s head tilts further to the side in a feat of flexibility, his eyebrows drawing together.

“Regretfully, if your name isn’t on the lease, I cannot--”

“Oh I’m just messing with you.” Wes pats the man on the shoulder and they share a stilted laugh. It’s a quick save, but Maka suspects he wouldn’t be above borrowing Soul’s key for an afternoon trip to get it copied.

Mortimer takes platter out of Wes’s hand with all the sterility of an indifferent butler. “If you’ll allow me, please,” he says, and smoothly exits the conversation.

They could really use more partygoers to help break the tension, or else she’ll have to resort to feeding Wes’s ego about the results of the interview. However, just as she’s wishing for anyone else to show up, Black Star comes jogging down the sidewalk, decked out in an outfit befitting a monster hybrid of Flashdance and a 2005 rave.

“Hey, babe,” he says, worming his way under Soul’s arm while his husband’s face rapidly transitions through all five stages of grief before returning to a hasty indifference. Then Black Star notices Maka. “Oh, I see we got our third wheel back,” he says, giving Soul a smooch on the cheek reminiscent of the 200-dozen photos of this exact pose that Maka regrets subjecting herself to.

She bites into a smile, eager to prove she is ‘as cool’ as Soul thinks she is. “Hello, Black Star.”

While Wes looks between her and the Blue-Raspberry Menace, clearly picking up on the hostile vibes, Soul just rolls his eyes to outer space. “Okay, no nuclear war in public. _Hi. D-dear,_ you should maybe shower -- there’s other people here. Like _your brother-in-law._ ” He waves a hand between the two of them, spewing a hurried, “Wes-Black Star-Black Star-Wes.”

The two shake hands and exchange exuberant ‘bro!’ ritual, but no level of hinting or blatant suggestion is enough. “Anyway, I’ll shower after I eat. Recovery protein is sacred.”

“That’s a choice you can make… I guess.”   

“Aw, look at you two,” Wes coos like he’s watching a pair of kittens and not two grown men. “Bickering like an old married couple. Well, not _old_ per se, though you might invest in some wrinkle cream for that forehead of yours.” He reaches for Soul’s forehead with the intent to smooth the scowl out from between his eyebrows.

Soul shies away from Wes, though he can’t escape very far with Black Star keeping him captive. “I won’t need it if you stop stressing me out all the time.”

“He’s very surly, but please take good care of my little brother, Bart.”

Maka thinks she might witness Soul’s soul screaming as it vacates his body while his husband wipes sweat from his forehead and amicably replies, “ **Black Star**.”

“Oh _that’s right_ ,” Wes says, as if he’s already forgotten how Soul had introduced Black Star _as_ ‘Black Star’. “Soul did mention you don’t go by your name. Why is that?”

Soul still looks like he’s wishing himself to another dimension, though the conversation appears to be pretty normal. If there’s any difference in atmosphere at all, Maka would have to say Black Star looks strangely _focused_ , which, the longer she looks at him, becomes slightly unnerving. Actually, it’s not unlike making accidental eye contact with Snappy. Perhaps Soul’s fight or flight reflex isn’t an exaggeration.

Black Star says, “Clearly you haven’t been saddled with a name like _Bartholomew,_ bruh.”

“That’s true,” Wes says easily enough. “But it’s a very interesting name! Two in one night-- we already met a ‘Mortimer’ who, by the way, is very handsome. Do any of you know if he’s single?” He looks over his shoulder, watching as the building manager waves in a white sedan pulling a small trailer with a barbecue.

Soul returns to the mortal plane. “Do _not_ hit on our lan--”

“On second thought, gonna take that shower, be right back,” Black Star interrupts, disentangling from Soul and dashing away at something close to the speed of light.

“What happened to ‘recovery protein’,” Maka murmurs aloud.

The Evans brothers watch as Soul’s husband leaps up the stairs, but Soul turns to Maka and says, “Not gonna question a blessing.” Wes, however, still wears a thoughtful look.

The celebrity catches her staring; his face quickly melts into a billboard smile, complete with a wink that nearly makes her blush. If she imagines it from Soul, she really _will_.

“If I could please have your attention,” Mortimer announces from the other side of the lot, “I fear we are in need of one or two strong-bodied individuals--”

Wes doesn’t miss a beat. “Oh, I know the _perfect_ candidate~”

Ah, this must be how Soul feels all the time. “I’m going, I’m going.”

Maka cuts Soul with her eyes when he fails to cover up a snort. “I, uh... I’ll come help?” he offers, holding in a laugh as he follows her over to the white car and trailer. Pitched only for her ears, he says, “Sorry, if I had known he was coming, I woulda warned the entire neighborhood. How’d your article go?”

That he’d even bring it up is both surprising and pleasing. “You know what, it actually--”

“Heya Junior!” a man calls from a rear passenger window. “Sorry we’re late.” Evidently he had not driven himself-- both front doors open two blonde women step out.

The driver says, “It was my bad, Patty had a post-office run and the line was enormous.” She walks to the back of the car and pops the trunk. The other blonde comes around the front of the car and immediately initiates a secret handshake with Moritmer, who, rather bizarrely, returns it equal parts businesslike and effortless.

“Hi Kid~”

“Hello. Introductions: Soul, Maka, this is Patricia Thompson. The one pulling out the wheelchair is Elizabeth Thompson-”

The woman groans. “ _Liz,_ I keep tellin’ you.”

Mortimer appears to find this irrelevant. He indicates the man sitting in the passenger seat of the sedan. “And this is my father, Mortimer Kidner Senior. The actual landlord.”

“Yo!” the man says with a wave to Soul and Maka. “’Morty’ is fine. Number six and number fourteen, right? Sorry for the late introduction, I don’t leave the house much!”

The two of them offer surprised Nice To Meet You’s while Mortimer ‘junior’ opens the car door and Liz unfolds a wheelchair with a practiced motion.

The landlord says, “Pat, if you would show them where to move the barbecue?”

“Aye-aye Mister Morty,” the young woman replies, waving for Soul and Maka to follow her up on the trailer and unstrap the grill.

Each of them carrying one end of the grill, Soul chivalrously opts to walk backwards as they move the hulking thing after Patricia. “He seems cool,” he says, a little breathless, which is a bit distracting but thankfully Maka manages to not trip over her own feet. “Anyway, you were saying about the article?”

She laughs. “Oh right. It actually went great? My editor thought it was so funny that she wants me to do an opinion piece next.”

Soul does a weird little head-toss in an attempt to get his hair out of his eyes. “What, you mean like a _not_ boring report?”

“Yeah!”

“Niiice! Good work, scoundrel.”

“Pfft. I mean, it might also be because my editor is one of your brother’s fangirls, but I’m still really grateful for your help.”

He stumbles just a little; shifts the weight of the barbecue differently in his hands. “You’re welcome.” They finally reach their destination, the two of them setting the grill down next to the folding tables. “I’m still shocked something _good_ happened as... the result of Wes’s narcissism...” Soul trails off mid-sentence, distracted.

“You okay?”

“I, uh--” He shuffles around in place, finally zeroing in on the bluetooth speaker on one of the tables. “What is that _music??”_

“Mathcore,” Mortimer (the younger) says, sounding close to excited though none of it shows on his face. He carries a bag of charcoal.

“Math-what?” Maka asks.

Mortimer nods towards the speaker. “Mathcore. It’s a layman term for the subgenre, but it is essentially aggressive hardcore showcasing rhythmic complexity. An intellectual’s death metal, if you will.”

The way Soul goes a little dead-eyed during the explanation is worrisome. “T-that sounds very exciting,” Maka offers. And then a cloud of Wolfthorn Old Spice descends upon the area.

“It’s the best workout music,” Black Star says, opening up the grill and investigating its innards. “Thanks for the music recs the other day, man. I need more!” He holds out a hand for the bag of charcoal, and Maka thinks Mortimer might actually be making use of one-- possibly _two--_ smile muscles.

“I am pleased to hear it.” The conversation then spirals into a slew of artists and commentary that leave Maka in the dust, and when she exchanges a look with Soul, she finds him visibly nauseated.

She leans over to quietly ask, “What’s up?”

Still keeping an eye on his husband and the building manager, he tilts towards her and whispers, “I didn’t know he’s been _fraternizing with the enemy.”_ Soul grimaces, watching as ‘Mister Morty’ joins the group and provides a bottle of lighter fluid, which Black Star uses to excessively douse the coals. “If that guy finds out about the gator _or_ the fake marriage because Star’s being buddy-buddy, we’ll be completely boned.”

She can confidently say that Mortimer does come across as a guy who’s a stickler for protocol, but Maka thinks there’s something else to worry about here. She tugs on Soul’s sleeve to say in his ear, “I can’t tell because he’s so _weird,_ but is Black Star ...flirting?”

Soul squints at the mathcore nerds for a long pause. “Shit,” he hisses under his breath. “I gotta separate ‘em.”

_"What’re we whispering about?”_

Maka and Soul both startle, leaping away from each other and from Wes, who leans forward with his arms crossed, eager to hear a conspiracy.

 **“Nothing.** God, can you wear like a bell or something?”

Wes playfully pouts. “It certainly didn’t look like nothing.”

“Actually,” Maka says, adding in a strangled sort-of laugh for good measure, “I was asking if it was possible I could get an autograph from you? F-for a friend, of course.” Wes positively beams, and while he excitedly goes on an anecdote about fans and hunts down a pen in his blazer, Maka makes a few violent hand signals for Soul to grab his problematic husband and escape.

All the commotion Wes makes draws the attention of Mortimer, Liz, and new arrivals to the potluck. Maka soon finds herself surrounded by fans.

“Damn, you’re really Wes Evans aren’t you?” Liz says before taking a selfie with him for her Instagram. “I already got my ticket to the festival.”

“I’m glad to hear it,” he says, handing Maka a folded-over paper napkin with his signature that she’s not sure what to do with. “Will you be going?” he asks her.

“To what?”

Patricia claps a hand to Maka’s shoulder. “Bode Thunder 2017! It’s Coachella for people who can’t go to Coachella.”

Mortimer blinks. “I’ve never heard of it.”

“Me neither,” Maka adds, self-conscious when the crowd collectively winces.

“Well, we’re just gonna have to fix that! I happen to have some tickets on me, since I’m one of the artists.” Wes pulls out an envelope from a pocket and hands Maka half a dozen of the tickets inside. “My thanks for that lovely interview,” he says.

Maka holds the tickets with the signed napkin, feeling out of place. “O-oh. Thanks very much?”

“Do me a favor and give two to my brother and my new-brother. They could use a date,” he says, then turns to Mortimer with his full attention, holding out another ticket. “And you, my well-dressed friend-- would you be interested in going to the festival?”

Liz laughs. “You’re barking up the wrong tree there, I think.”

“Do any of the artists perform songs with a 13/8 time signature?” Mortimer asks, letting the ticket hang in the air. “If not, I regret to say that I would not be particularly interested in attending.”

Wes Evans, for a small moment in time, is too stunned for words. After a long session of rapid blinking, he does manage an inelegant, “What?”

The building manager takes a breath, deconstructing his speech patterns a few levels to reach ‘basic’. He says, “...I only listen to mathcore, sorry.”

Both to avoid the crowd and to make an attempt at not laughing at Wes’s dumbstruck face, Maka scuttles over to Soul and Black Star, who are having a discussion over her potato salad on the steps leading to their apartment.

“Since when have you established a bro-rapport with the Manager We Agreed To Avoid At All Costs?” Soul drawls, scooting over on the stair to make room for Maka to sit.

Black Star inhales potato salad at inhuman speeds. “Keep your husband close and your enemies closer?”

“Okay, but you’re literally staring at his ass,” Maka says.

Soul thwaps him on the head with his paper plate. “You are a _married man.”_

“I can’t help it! I just wanna... have a deadlift competition with him or something, you know?”

Soul makes a face like a disgruntled muppet. “No. What? He’s a twig--”

“Actually, _you’re_ the twig,” Black Star says, impatient. “I ran into him one time in the laundry room. He pushed the vending machine with one hand so he could sweep under it with a broom.” Twin splotches of rosy pink appear on his cheeks.

Maka blandly says, “Who’s the thirsty one now,” and Soul makes a valiant attempt at not choking on his own spit. Black Star, having finished his potato salad, just melts into the stairwell like a lovesick Disney princess.

“Oh my god, I think I felt sympathetic for you for a second,” says Soul. “Look, you’re just gonna have to pine **very inconspicuously** until we graduate.”

For what some may consider very petty reasons, Maka finds a little bit of joy in Black Star’s suffering. “Don’t look now, but I think your brother-in-law is trying to hit on your crush again.”

“ _Bros don’t get crushed, they get emotionally arm-wrestled,_ ” Black Star retorts with a manic gleam in his eye which lasts all of three seconds before he rubs his face with a hand. “Soul. Bro of my life.”

“Uh, y-yeah?”

“I may need an intervention.”

“Alright, uh--” Soul glances over at Maka, but all she can offer him are confused eyebrows and a shrug. “...Hey, go feed your allidaughter.”

Black Star rises with a look of determination, dropping his empty plate on top of Soul’s as he climbs the stairs. “Our beautiful child could use some quality parenting right now.”

Regarding the paper plates with a sigh, Soul sets the garbage on an empty step. He doesn’t make any comment, but Maka is keenly aware of the awkward position he’s in: his fake husband has a crush on someone he can’t have, whereas Soul himself had expressed interest in dating _her--_ someone who was allowed to know their secret-- but who had denied him.

Maka idly taps her shoes together, wondering if there’s any point in playing it safe all the time if no one gets what they really want. “So, they were all talking about something called ‘Bode Thunder’? Is that a thing I should be interested in?”

Sitting up a little straighter, Soul looks at her in surprise. “Shit, _yeah,_ if you wanna write an opinion article, that’d be the best place to do it, hands down.” He sticks his thumbnail between his teeth, gnawing with thought. “Damn, I wonder if I can get tickets from Wes. That’s the festival I was telling you about, at the open-mic.”

“Tada,” Maka says, unwrapping the tickets from the signed napkin and fanning them out in her hands. “He just gave me some.”

“Oh.”

“I guess I should go, then, to write that piece. But I’ve never been to a festival before.”

Soul’s eyes flit over her face. “You mentioned that, yeah.”

“Would you be interested in showing me the ropes? I’m a little out of my element.”

The smile that spreads across his lips is magnetic, and she considers drifting towards it. “I think I can do that,” he says.

“THE RIBS ARE HERE~” Wes sing-songs, coming to the bottom of the stairs and holding up a tray of food. “A peace offering part deux.”

“What’s the catch,” Soul asks, unimpressed. Not that it stops him from plucking a rib from the tray.

“Go get your guitar, I wanna do a mini conc--”

Mouth full, Soul angrily garbles, “NO.” Swallows. “Man, what are you even doing here? How did you get off your leash?”

Wes clucks his tongue. “I already told you. Little brother, you eloped, you don’t even ‘like’ any of Mom’s comments on your wedding photos, and so I came to check up on you and figure out why you didn’t accept Dad’s very humble gift of a t-- _”_

“ **Mister Evans** ,” says a voice filled with obvious displeasure. Which makes watching Wes’s expression turn into something like _excitement at being caught_ exceedingly bizarre.

Soul’s brother pivots promptly on a heel. “Hello my favorite donut!”

It’s Wes’s assistant, Harvar, as sharply dressed as a knife and his scowl just as cutting. “That is not my name.”

“Yes, but ‘Eclair’ is a type of donut,” Wes says, draping his arm behind the man’s neck. “And it is my favorite. I like the cream filling~”

“You’re lactose intolerant. Also, your meeting started forty-five minutes ago and Ox is saving your ass right now so _get in the cab.”_

As Harvar leads Wes away, the celebrity twists around and says to Maka, “Keep an eye on my brother, would you?” which is a request she’s not sure what to do with.

Once Wes has departed via taxi and his assistant has driven the fancy car out of the parking lot, Soul very wearily asks, “Can you volunteer yourself into a Witness Protection program?”

* * *

 

Soul’s main issue is that almost no one believes him when he says his brother is a mess. They’re too charmed by his dazzling, David Bowie-meets-Ken Doll persona, oblivious to the observant, calculating mind constantly trying to gain the upper hand. And the tragic part is that Soul’s personal life is most often the target.

He isn’t surprised in the slightest when his brother shows up-- in fact, he’s been expecting this since the potluck. The coast is as clear as it _can_ be, given the situation: Black Star is in class; Snappy is sleeping under the bed. Soul opens the deadbolt and prepares to face the music.      

“Brother dearest.” Wes’s grin is blinding.

“Speaking,” Soul says with all the enthusiasm of a suburban housewife who’s run out of wine. He is equally unsurprised when his brother barges into his apartment without an invitation. “To what do I owe this pleasure.”

“We need to talk.”

Soul blinks.

“About your life choices,” Wes adds. Well, that’s nothing new. He’s been pushing Soul through life from an early age, arranging his playdates in grade school and harassing him over college applications.

“Which ones?” Dispirited, Soul drifts into the kitchen to heat water for tea; he might as well get settled in for whatever is to come. “I don’t know if you’re in a place to judge when you invite an entire parking lot of people to come to your concert for free. One day Harv is gonna lock you in a trunk and never let you out.”

Wes tsks with a perfect impression of their mother’s Level 5 Disapproval Face. “Harvar adores me. I made that barbecue **fun.** Speaking of: you seem awfully friendly with your neighbor.”

“Which one, I’m friends with all of my neighbors,” Soul lies. “Apartment Living 101: It’s easier to make noise if no one will complain about you. You wouldn’t understand, since you’ve never lived anywhere that didn’t cost less than two grand a month.” He refuses to make eye contact. Though Wes has followed him into the kitchen, Soul focuses solely on his task of pouring tea into a pair of mugs.  

“Quit trying to twist the subject. _Maka,_ Soul. Ma-ka!” Wes hisses, leaning on the kitchen counter.

“Oh, you finally remembered her name.” Steeling himself with his most practiced blank stare, Soul looks his brother in the eye, hands him a cup of tea, and says, “Nice girl. _Friendly._ I can have friends, you know, or is that not allowed?”

With the way Wes squints at him, Soul can tell he hasn’t dissipated the suspicion entirely. All he can hope for now is that his brother doesn’t go into Nancy Drew mode and start snooping around for clues, or god forbid, talking to Maka. Not that he’d worry about her spilling his secret, he just doesn’t want her to have to put up with a second-rate interrogation. “Just because we’re related doesn’t mean I’ll condone you philandering around behind your poor husband’s back,” Wes says, stink-eye intensifying over the rim of his mug as he takes a sip.

Exasperated, Soul replies, “I wouldn’t expect you to, geeze.” With all his effort put into maintaining his composure, Soul can feel himself starting to sweat and he prays Wes doesn’t notice. “More importantly, I’d never do that to someone.”

That much is true -- or it would be, if his relationship wasn’t a sham.

Surely Wes’s eyes must be narrowed too intently to see anymore, but he makes his point all the same. “You’re hiding something.” He sets his mug on the counter with a clunk. “I dunno what it is, but I _will_ make you spill the beans.”  

“Let me know when you find out.” Soul sips his tea. “I’m curious to know what I’m doing wrong too.” There’s nothing to worry about; there’s no proof, and no evidence that anything is amiss. Considering Maka had already made it clear that they should just be friends, things should be in the clear -- as long as Black Star keeps his _emotional arm-wrestling_ in his pants.

“I’m sure it won’t be long. I always win, little brother. You’ll be hearing from me _very_ soon.”

Of that last bit, Soul has no doubt, but just because he’s come to terms with his fate doesn’t mean Wes needs to know that. “Make sure you call before you come by. I wouldn’t want to be caught doing anything compromising.”

A frustrated growl boils in the back of Wes’s throat but comes out muffled through thinly pressed lips.

“Was that all you came over for?” Soul continues. Though he has no such plans, he says, “I have to head out soon to meet Black Star for lunch.”

“That’s it.” Wes’s frown reaches a depth which Soul suspects may be irreversible. He’d consider pointing out the potential for wrinkling if he wasn’t trying to get his brother out of his face. Besides, while the horror would be incredibly satisfying in the long run, vengeance would be swift and painful. “Enjoy your lunch.”  

Wes makes gratuitous ‘I’m-watching-you’ gestures with both hands on his way to the door, to which Soul offers a simple wave. As soon as the latch clicks and he hears frustrated stomping down the stairs, he stumbles his way to the couch and flops face down into the cushions.

This fake marriage would surely be causing premature graying if his hair weren’t already so light. He weighs quick pros and cons of filling in Maka on this new development, and decides full disclosure is best at this point. He had promised honesty after all, and also it’s just a relief to have someone to rant to who knows the truth. He sends off a quick text to let her know that his brother thinks they’re having an illicit affair.

Maka’s response includes several strings of indignant key-smashes and some shockingly colorful emoji use, but she eventually returns to English, asking why he doesn’t just tell Wes the truth.

Sadly, the only answer he can come up with is that it’s complicated. Soul isn’t inherently against his brother knowing-- if the stakes were different, he probably would come clean, especially since it _might_ stop Wes from dropping in with any more family heirlooms that make Soul sick with guilt. But, despite all of Wes’s calculative cunning, his weakness is gossip, and if the nature of Soul’s marriage was found out, it would spell very real legal trouble. It’s best if everyone stays in dark about the whole thing, if not for Soul’s sake then for Black Star’s.

Replying to her text, he explains that he trusts her with that information more than he trusts his brother; it seems like the best way to put it, and Maka’s already met Wes enough times to know it’s a reasonable concern. Thankfully, she drops the subject, asking what he’s doing tomorrow and if he wants to get together to study. She even suggests meeting in the library so he doesn’t have to worry about any unintended company unless Wes resorts to actual stalking.

The next day, Soul meets Maka at the library and it’s a good thing he isn’t counting on getting anything done because she has taken over an entire table with an arsenal of supplies. Her laptop is already enough of a tank to take up more than its fair share of real estate, but between her books and the buffer of snacks lined up against the windowsill, she looks ready to move in.

“Oh, hey, sit down.” Maka hurried clears off one of the four chairs and makes an attempt at containing her hoard.

Soul props his tablet up in the tiny space allotted to him and shoves his backpack in the last unoccupied space: the floor. “How’s it going?”

“Good, great. I’m just trying to get ahead in time for Bode Thunder,” she says, Tetrising her papers before settling on one to write on.

Bemused, he says, “You know that isn’t for like three more weeks, right?”    

“I know, I know -- I just figure if I get a couple days ahead every week from now until then, I’ll be all set.” Maka tugs an elastic off her wrist and hurriedly ties her hair up. It’s a no-nonsense ponytail, but the movement of it draws Soul’s attention from his screen, the ends of her hair brushing along the line of her neck.

Uhg. Emotional arm-wrestled.

“So diligent,” he says, looking away. “I’m lucky if I’m only a couple days behind.” He pulls his headphones out of his bag; he’s not one who’s into study sessions, but it’d be nice to catch up on some video lectures from classes he’d missed while trying to keep a leash on his brother.

Maka gets this look on her face though that drags Soul straight back out of his zone. He should know by now that she can’t tell when he’s joking or not. “Soul, you really should take your school work seriously,” she says, then leans in and drops to a whisper. “Especially, you know, to take advantage of your situation.”

Soul can’t help but laugh. “Ha!” He stretches his arms behind his head and leans back in his chair. “Never thought I’d hear you telling me to play the system.”

“You’re _already_ playing the system,” she squeaks. “I’m just telling you to make the most of it.”     

“So you’re saying I should take my tax benefits while I can get them?”

“I am _not.”_ She slaps a hand on the table and he’s glad they’re in a loud enough area that the smack only garners a handful of concerned looks. It’s too fun riling her up-- the murderous gleam in her eyes makes just goads him further.

“Hey, if you let me do my work now, maybe I could catch up to you,” Soul grins, pressing the play button to start his lecture and putting his headphones on. He leaves one side perched behind his ear just in case Maka has something else to say, but she takes him at face value and buries her nose in a book, the tips of her own ears tinting red.

Maybe studiousness is a little bit contagious. With Maka working so hard, Soul feels pressured enough to not only catch up on his classes, but start some reading for the coming week. But there’s only so much he can take before his energy starts to wane and his stomach announces its needs. Loudly.

“I brought snacks.” Maka tosses a sandwich bag of trail mix across the table.

Soul eyes it, unenthused over pumpkin seeds and a distinct lack of chocolate. “You can’t live off of nuts and dried fruit you know. I might actually get some real dinner. If you want you could--”

“I could eat,” she jumps in cheerily. “But I still have a lot to get done.”

Does she not believe in breaks? “Here’s a thought, we could order in and keep working at my place.” Honestly, he’s anxious to get back to his couch and his slippers and his infinite supply of hot drinks just waiting to be made.

The only problem will be if Maka misunderstands his intentions. “That’s…” she pauses, head tilting and eyebrows scrunched, “...actually a really good idea. Okay, I’ll just grab some stuff from home and meet you back there.”

What else she can possibly _have_ to grab, Soul does not know. But he nods and says, “Okay, see you in a few,” and heads out. He’d wait for her to pack up, but he could use the head start to make sure the place is presentable and a WWE match between cat and alligator hasn’t broken out.

What meets his eyes, ears, and nose when Soul returns to his apartment, however, is magnitudes worse than his darkest nightmares.

The smell of refried beans and burnt chili powder lingers in the air. Black Star has betrayed what little faith in the bro-code Soul had left, _and let Wes into their home without so much of a warning text._ And, to add insult to more insult, they’re laughing in the kitchen -- probably at Soul’s expense -- and cooking tacos, of all things.

Why this? Why now? Neither one of them should be left unsupervised near an oven; both at once is a definite safety hazard. How could Harvar allow this to happen? _He should know better_.

Still gaping in the doorway, Soul slowly turns in place to find Harvar on the couch, feet on the coffee table, texting with one hand and scratching Snappy under the chin with the other.

“What the fuck is this?” Soul says, finally regaining enough sense to shut the door behind him. Maka _cannot_ come over to this circus. He needs to abort mission, change his name, and move to Canada.

“Soul! It’s about time you got home.” Over his shoulder, Soul watches in horror as Wes waves a spatula, oblivious as a glob of beans falls to the counter with a hair-raising splat. There’s no question who will be cleaning up this mess later, and it won’t be either of the hooligans or their enabler.

“Hey sugarbear.” Black Star greets him with a wave, eats a spoonful of guacamole, and then proceed to use the aforementioned spoon to continue stirring. Heathen. He can’t even bring up the unhygienic behavior, as he is already supposed to be swapping spit with the guy under the sanctity of marriage.

If it wouldn’t be immediately suspicious, he’d walk right back out and retreat to Maka’s. He’s trapped. Soul sends an apologetic text to Maka and resigns himself to hell. “What a surprise -- Wes came over uninvited again.”       

“I’m not here to see you,” his brother chortles. “I thought I should really spend some time getting to know my new favorite brother.”

Incredible. Only someone related to him could make Soul so annoyed and deal a blow to his ego in one fell swoop. “I see you’ve met your reptilian niece.”

“Snappy introduced herself -- came right out from under the couch as soon as Wes showed up. She loves him!” Black Star waves his double-dipping spoon in Soul’s direction. Figures two cold blooded reptiles would get along so well.

“Now I can see why you’re always trying to get me out of the apartment,” Wes says. “But now that I’m in on your little secret, you can’t have any more excuses. I’ll be around _much_ more. Plus, you live like two blocks from Cinnabon.”

Soul’s blood turns to ice. Apparently not having a proper day 9-to-5 job for so long has driven his brother to madness. “I don’t have time to babysit you.”  

“Oh? Have some plans tonight? Plans involving a certain blonde?” Wes pries. Apparently the alligator in the room isn’t enough to get him off Soul’s ass about his relationships.

“Nope.” Soul contains a sigh. “I was going to spend some quality time with my husband, but then you had to come over and ruin everything.”

Wes gasps and clutches his heart. “So dramatic,” he sputters. “But don’t let me stop you, just pretend I’m not even here.”

“We’re not into exhibitionism.”

“Well, _he’s_ not,” Black Star adds.

Coming this far without projectile vomiting would be a waste if he gave up now. Soul nudges Snappy’s tail to the side and joins the only other sane person in the apartment on the couch. Harvar may have betrayed his trust by allowing this to happen, but at least he isn’t actively trying to crush his hopes and dreams.

“So, how’s it going, Harv?” Soul asks, trying to ignore the disaster in the kitchen.

Harvar doesn’t so much as look up from his phone. “Fine.”

Soul has really got his work cut out for him. His brother’s assistant is even worse with small talk than he is, but if he doesn’t focus on something other than ‘Catastrophe; obnoxious’ taking place in his home, he will scream into the void and never stop. “...I see you and Snappy are getting along?”

Over the edge of the sunglasses that have slipped down the bridge of his nose, the assistant gives Soul a look of chronic disappointment. Pushing the shades back up his nose, Harvar hauls the gator into his lap and says, “She’s beautiful and you don’t deserve her.”

“Oh my god, you’re infected.” Soul melts into the couch and pulls out his phone, texting Maka updates on the situation to keep his head above water and a foot outside of the Twilight Zone.

Meanwhile, overpowering taco smells intensify and threaten to overtake the stratosphere. There’s just something about overcooked beans that makes Soul want to hurl, and being hungry on top of that isn’t helping. All he wanted was to order some pizza or lo mein, watch Maka’s nose scrunch up while she studies, and not be the only sane being in the apartment. Where the heck is Blair? He needs comfort.

Finally, Wes announces that dinner is ready, but Soul isn’t sure he can even eat anymore. He has to try, though, if he doesn’t want to offend the chefs. The sooner he gets this over with the better.

Black Star hands him a plate. “Here you go, honey-cakes.”

“Thanks, babe,” Soul mutters, too defeated to be embarrassed. He sits back on the couch, plate in his lap. The food piques Snappy’s interest and she starts to struggle in Harvar’s arms to get a taste of taco.

Well, at least Soul knows what to do if it’s unpalatable. He wraps up the greasy edges of the tortilla and prepares for burnt meat or perhaps too much sour cream. What he doesn’t expect is for his taste buds to die in the fiery grasp of hell.

Soul chokes. “What did you put in this?”     

“Uh… cayenne.” Black Star stops to think for a second. “Chili powder, cumin… all the regular stuff. Oh, and some habaneros.”

His voice comes out in the squeakiest of death-throes. “Wes!” That asshole-- _this is his fault_.

“What’s wrong, buddy?” Wes coos, both innocent and menacing, like a pigeon about to ruin someone’s day. “Oh, can you _still_ not eat spicy food? Funny, Black Star didn’t even remind me-- do you two not cook together often?”

“Fuck off into the sun,” Soul says, slamming his plate to the table and scrambling to the kitchen for some water, or bread, _anything_.

Snappy makes a beeline for the food but Harvar swoops the plate out of her reach, polishes off Soul’s food himself in a matter of moments, and presents the empty plate in front of the disappointed alligator. “Those were… surprisingly not terrible.”

“Wow,” Wes says, shocked. “That is the nicest thing I’ve ever heard you say, Havarti.”

After a blessed session of chugging milk from the carton, Soul shuts the fridge door a little too hard. “ **Okay** , now that we’ve bonded over poisoning me, you’ve had your fun,” he says, already feeling his stomach revolt against the one bite of heartburn-city he’d chewed. “Can you let me get things done in peace?”

“Of course.” Wes beams. “Don’t mind us.”

His brother just couldn’t let him get away with hinting, could he? “I meant can you leave? Please?” Soul keeps his voice even and his words measured, letting the tension build in his blood. He’ll have an aneurysm before he lets himself get into another argument.

Maybe his brother has developed a sense of pity. Or maybe Wes just senses Soul’s patience wearing thin. Either way, the results are the same. “Alright, but I’m stealing your husband to go out for drinks. You’re in aren’t you, Black Star?”

Polishing off the last of his meal, Black Star says, “Yeah man, let’s do it!”

There are a multitude of alarm bells going off at this new predicament, but if Wes takes Black Star off his hands then he can have some bonafide quiet, and Soul has reached new levels of Desperate. He practically shoos all three of them out of the apartment with a harried, “Don’t stay out too late.”

Tonight had not gone as planned-- and the day had started off so well too. Soul curls up the on edge of the couch and pulls out his phone to send Maka one more text to apologize for cancelling. There’s already a message waiting from her in his inbox though.

_[[everything going okay over there?]]_

_[[yeah they finally just left. sorry about tonight.]]_ he sends back, now even more disappointed that he didn’t get the calm night in he’d wanted. He’s still hungry, too, but the kitchen is still in the aftermath of hurricane Wes-Star and he’s just not ready to face it yet. Soul digs out some raw chicken from the fridge for Snappy so she’ll quit looking at him like he murdered her family, then returns to fetal position.  

After a few minutes, there’s a knock at the door, and his heart drops through his stomach. Wes probably forgot something, or decided he wasn’t done playing Sherlock yet. Whatever. Black Star should have keys and can let them in; Soul refuses to move.

“Soul? Are you still up?” Maka says through the door, and he nearly barrel rolls off the couch.

“Yeah, sorry, coming,” he calls, hurrying to the door and magnificently fumbling with the lock.

She’s holding a pizza box. “I heard there was a bean incident.”

Soul has never been happier to see someone in his life.

Maka doesn’t end up staying long; it’s getting late and they’re both tired. It’s nice having someone around who actually comprehends his need to decompress after stressful bullshit. He nearly feels back in control of his life.

Before she leaves, though, she pauses in the doorway, twisting to look at Soul in seriousness. “I’m not gonna say the way Wes has been harassing you is cool, but I do think he’s pretty worried about you.”

He’s not sure what to say to that, and to his silence, she scratches the side of her face with a finger and adds, “S-sorry. It’s not really my business. It’s just… I have some experience with overprotective family.” An awkward laugh. “I think if you trusted your brother too, you might be less stressed out. I don’t know the whole situation, though, so. Just my thoughts. I’ll see you later?” she asks, hopeful.

“Yeah,” he says, finding his missing voice. “Thanks again, Maka.”

Once she leaves, the bliss of the quiet apartment is interrupted only once: Blair scratches at the door around midnight, toting home some unfortunate tenant’s sock. Soul wearily flips off the kitchen and falls gratefully into his couch bed, trying to see Wes through whatever viewpoint Maka had that brought her to the conclusion that his brother is ‘pretty worried’ about him.

Falls asleep with this in mind, though the luxury doesn’t last long. Black Star returns late, predictably tipsy. Despite his best efforts to be quiet, he bumps into about three things on his way to the bedroom. The final collision includes a stupendous fall after tripping over Soul’s foot where it hangs over the edge of the couch.

“Shit, sorry, man,” Black Star says before fumbling his way past. Soul rolls over and goes back to sleep; he’s not willing to give up the peace of being unconscious just yet.

Figures Wes would have other ideas. There’s a raucous knocking on the front door at some awful hour because apparently he’s never heard of a hangover. Equally impervious to alcohol, Black Star had left at the asscrack of dawn for a run, so Soul had been left to wallow, exhausted, on the couch. There’s just no justice. Careful not to step on any sleeping animals, Soul picks his way over to the front door and greets his inhuman brother.

“Are you just moving in or what?” Soul asks. With so many battles lost, he’s about done with this war.

His brother slinks in without so much as a ‘don’t mind if I do,’ making himself right at home. “Sleeping on the couch? Trouble in paradise little brother?” he says, planting his ass right on Soul’s pillow.

Of course that’s the first thing out of his mouth. But Soul has been dodging questions for a long time and his agility is unrivaled. “Or, I was waiting up for my husband, who you kept out late partying, and fell asleep out here.”

Alas, even that does nothing to wipe the smug and pompous look off Wes’s face.

“Your cheekbones look very snatched today,” Soul says helplessly. “I have to go to class, so feel free to address your career at any time. I’d think with the festival coming up that you’d have things to prepare, but hey, what do I know.”

“Don’t mind me taking time out of my busy schedule to visit you,” Wes says, kicking his feet up on the couch, shoes still on. Soul can feel his brain threatening to explode. “You go to class -- I’ll be right here.”

“Does Harv even know where you are?”

“He has the day off. ...Don’t give me that look, I’m not some heartless boss.”

Soul shuffles to the bedroom for a change of clothes, entertaining the seductive thought of taking the day off from being related to the king of frosted highlighter. “I dunno what you expect to find here, creep, just don’t burn the place down.” At least there’s nothing around that would give away the state of Soul’s relationship -- unless Wes went so far as to kidnap his tablet and hire someone to break into it.

...Better take that to campus with him. Technically, Soul doesn’t even have class for a few more hours, but he’s bound to get better rest napping on a library couch than at home. He gets dressed and ready to go while pointedly avoiding both eye contact and conversation with his brother. Feeds the cat. Turns on the kettle so Wes can have tea-- he’s not some heartless brother.

When he gets to campus and scopes out a quiet bean bag to pass out on, the thought of Wes unsupervised in his sanctuary brings him nothing but stress dreams involving his brother rifling through all of his stuff, finding the last of the unclaimed panties, and making a flag out of them to start a parade in the apartment complex’s parking lot. Soul only needs to wake up in a sweat from that once to give up on extra shuteye. He seeks out the largest cup of coffee available and waits for his classes to start.

Perhaps Maka had been onto something about this stress being somewhat needless. He ends up skipping his last class just to get back and make sure his brother isn’t ruining his life. Soul climbs the stairs quietly; if he’s lucky, maybe he can catch Wes in the act and call him out. Then he’d have a really good excuse for permanently uninviting him into the apartment.

But when Soul swings the door open, his brother is _precisely_ where he left him, which is the most unnerving thing of all.       

“Welcome home,” Wes says, turning a page in one of the sporting magazines Black Star keeps conveniently located in every room of the apartment. “How was school?”  

“Are you human?” Soul blurts. “I mean, yes. Fine. School was fine.”

He stalks off to make an important Perimeter Check, searching for evidence of snooping; the problem with this being a good portion of the apartment is so messy after last night that he can’t tell if anything’s moved.

Soul assures himself that Wes would be gloating if he’d found out anything, so his silence must mean he’s still in the dark. Surely he has to be getting tired of this. He pops his head out of the bedroom. “Have you seen Star at all?”

Wes closes his magazine and uncrosses his leg. “Yeah, he came in, asked me to feed Snappy, and left again.”

“Oh. Uh, cool, thanks.” Somewhat at a loss, Soul tosses his school bag on the floor and heads for the bathroom. If he’s going to start pretending like his brother isn’t there, he might as well take a shower. He’d missed out yesterday; that impromptu dinner party had thrown him off his groove.

He’s greeted by the latest curtain: Kermit the frog sipping tea. He takes off his clothes and prepares to use up the entire tank of hot water. Something isn’t quite right, though; there’s a smell he can’t quite place that pervades the room. Had Snappy left a gross present in the tub? It was Star’s turn to clean it out before he left, today--

Behind the latest shower curtain: taco leftovers. Pettier than a soccer mom scoping a parking spot at Target, Wes had taken everything, as well as Snappy’s raw chicken, and dumped it in the bathtub. Snappy enjoys her meal thoroughly, rolling in whatever hadn’t made it into her mouth; from snout to tail, she’s covered in beans.

Soul puts Kermit back.

Wrapping a towel around his waist, he stomps back out to the living room to find Wes very studiously catching up on his YouTube subscriptions on his smartphone.

There’s no way this was so innocently intended -- Soul doesn’t buy it for one second. Not with these ‘spill the beans’ connotations. This was intentional sabotage, against him, and against his reptilian step-child. Fuming, he doesn’t even know where to start, so he ends up saying, “Alligators don’t eat beans.”

Wes snickers, his attempts to muffle his laughter are weak at best. “I figured they would be put to good use since you didn’t seem to appreciate them very much.”

“Are you twelve?” he asks, Wes trying to contain a self-satisfied smirk. Soul might as well put himself out of his misery. “Just tell me what you want.”

“You know what I want,” Wes simpers. It’s true, but that isn’t going to stop Soul from staring at him until he spells it out because there’s no way he’s going to volunteer any information he doesn’t have to. “Tell me what the _deal_ is, Soul. I know something is up.”

Soul squints. It’s very much like his brother to meddle in his life, but he’s starting to get ticked off with how little faith Wes is putting in him. “Because you think I’m a cheater?”   

“I don’t know, are you?”  

“No!” Soul squawks. “I would never -- _you should know that._ ” They grew up together, so it would be nice to think they know each other. “First of all, I’m not dating Maka.” He doesn’t include the part where that’s not by his choice, but he’s being indignant here and he needs every bit of ammunition.

“So you claim,” Wes interjects, scrolling through his phone.

Soul shakes off the jab and continues, “Second of all, even if I were, it wouldn’t be an issue because-” He was on such a roll; it’s so cathartic shouting at his brother. But sensibility and fear of discovery kick in and he drops his voice to a whisper. Even if they’re in his own apartment, and there’s no one around but the pets, it still feels wrong to say it too loud. “Our marriage is a sham, okay? Both of us are just in it for the federal loan benefits.”

He expects a reaction, a shocked gasp, or at least a surprised expression, but all he gets is a raised eyebrow and a mild hum like Wes had just come across something interesting on youtube.

“What?” Soul hisses. “Do you not believe me?”

Wes shrugs. “Eh. Sounds reasonable enough.”

Something’s not adding up. Wes Evans, king of drama, nuclear over-reactor of the century, doesn’t have anything to say. Either Soul is dreaming or… “Star already told you.”

Wes finally glances up. “I was worried he was cheating on you,” he says like it’s a logical conclusion. “I came to beat him up but it turns out he’s a really cool guy.”

Soul very nearly feels touched-- but then remembers there is a beangator in his bathroom and Wes is _Catastrophe; obnoxious_ made flesh. Wes had come over looking for Black Star, but then they’d been chatting so amiably by the time Soul showed up. He’s been played. “If you knew, why didn’t you just say so?” Soul yelps. “And you were bugging me about Maka too.”

“That was before I knew, though I suspected you wouldn’t _really_ have an affair. Mother raised us to be gentlemen, after all.” That sly weasel. “I just wanted you to tell me the truth.”

Too stunned to do much more than gape like a fish, Soul hears Snappy do another refried barrel roll in the tub, so he wordlessly returns to the bathroom to rinse her off and slop her meal into the toilet to flush away to a distant oblivion he almost longs for. Hops in the shower and tries to scrub off the Weird.

Dressed and smelling eighty percent less like a bad night at Taco Bell, Soul returns to the living room to find Wes making himself home in the kitchen. “Want some tea?”

“Sure.” Soul slumps his way to the couch and collapses, melting his way to a horizontal position. He can’t even be bothered to make sure Wes isn’t wreaking any havoc.

Wes appears a few minutes later with a pair of mugs, setting one in front of Soul’s face while pushing his feet off the couch. “Maka does seem like a nice girl.”

“True.”  
“Shame you aren’t dating.”

“Also true.” Soul sniffs his mug with suspicion. He may have waved the flag of surrender, but that doesn’t mean he’s _stupid._ He wouldn’t put it past his brother to tamper with his tea just for the sake of not wasting an opportunity for a good laugh.

“Who knows, Bode Thunder is coming up. You and Maka can have some alone time, in a tent, under the stars,” Wes trails off.

The tea doesn’t _taste_ poisoned. “Surrounded by other tents probably with some drunk asshole puking nearby,” Soul continues. His brother probably has private VIP camping and hasn’t had to deal with the general populace for a long time. “Gonna be super romantic with my fake husband just a few feet away.”  

That’s coming right up, too-- they really need to discuss the tent situation. After the potluck, Star had been pretty insistent that he wanted to come too, and had also somehow convinced Mortimer to come along. In Soul’s ideal world, he and Maka would share a tent and Black Star could sleep on the moon, but with the building manager coming, they will have to keep up the married pretense.

Maybe they’ll be lucky and Wes will continue his attempts in wooing Mortimer with fame and fortune, spirit him off to VIP camping, and Black Star will go crowd surfing for three days and come back with enough curly fries to last them through the year.

“Well, that sounds like your problem, not mine.” Wes throws the rest of his hot drink back in one gulp and returns his mug to the kitchen. Soul watches him, puzzled, takes a sip of his still steaming cup, and wonders if his brother’s throat is made of steel. “Now if you’ll excuse me, all of this visiting has put me a smidge behind rehearsal schedule.”

All that trouble and now he’s just going to waltz out of here. Soul puts his mug down with a thunk, accidentally splashing tea on the table. “ _Waitawaitawaitaminute_ \-- you’re can’t let this out, you know that, right?”

“You wound me, little brother. I am a _vault._ I never told you when the Dad’s dog ate your gerbils, did I?” Wes puts his cardigan on with a swirl, model-walking around the apartment to collect his things like he hadn’t just dropped a bomb on Soul’s childhood. “I don’t really get why you insist on doing everything the hard way, but I got your back, bro.”

“I--” He’s still reeling and can’t form words; Wes is already on his way out the door. “ _Mom told me they ran away.”_

Poor Chopin and Gershwin.


	3. Chapter 3

Operation Bode Thunder 2017 gets underway mostly via texting. Maka is still trying to get ahead on school and work and Kim has been breathing down her neck for the past two weeks making sure she has a serious schedule for the festival.

“I got you a media pass.” Kim dangles a sleek badge in front of Maka’s monitor, distracting her focus from making a band spreadsheet. “And I’m sending you with one of our cameras. I already checked it out under your name, so if you break it, you buy it.”  

The badge clatters on Maka’s keyboard before she can protest that it’s not really fair to make her responsible for work supplies when Kim is the one turning this excursion into an assignment. At least the newspaper is giving her a stipend to rent camping supplies. That was about to be an unplanned dent to her budget that she can now avoid as long as she keeps the precious camera intact.

 _[[i have to take pictures now, too. i still don’t have a clue about which shows to go to.]]_ Maka worriedly texts Soul.

 _[[dont worry about it kim wont even know what hit her]]_ comes the fast reply.

She packs the badge in her bag and forwards her spreadsheet to Soul. It’s been awkward trying to find times to meet thanks to the ever-looming presence of Black Star and (albeit less-frequent) surprise visits from Wes. Texting is easy and convenient and allows Maka to keep ignoring any forbidden chemistry between her and her neighbor. She’s almost glad Black Star will be attending the festival-- he’ll surely put a damper on things lest temptation convinces her to make any bad decisions that will inevitably come back to bite her in the ass.

It’s about to hit five o’clock, and while she’s used to staying late, she’s been wanting to try setting boundaries between work and personal time. If Kim isn’t going to come back with the camera, Maka would prefer to jump ship and avoid the responsibility for a little longer. She logs out of the computer and hastily puts away the rest of her stuff.  

“Kim, I’m heading out,” Maka shouts back on her way out the door. It almost feels like she’s doing something wrong not waiting around to lock up the office, but she’s making enough of a sacrifice agreeing to do this piece on Bode Thunder.

She walks out to her car and drives home, ready go get in pajamas and call it a day. She’s barely gotten inside, taken her makeup off, and put her sweats on when there’s a knock at the door. Of course-- why _wouldn’t_ someone show up the moment she’s turned into a dumpster gremlin? Praying it isn’t Kim chasing after her to foist off an expensive camera, she stretches up to the peep hole.

Potentially even more troublesome, it’s Mortimer. “What’s up?” Maka says, swinging the door open and trying her best to imitate Soul’s put-upon expression.

“Fourteen,” he says, somewhat out of habit, then gives his head a small shake. “Rather, Ms. Albarn.”

“Maka is fine.”

He seems to brighten marginally at her response. She recalls Soul telling her how the building manager ‘keeps trying to make friends’, and she ends up lowering her guard, a bit-- she knows well enough that making new friends is scary. He asks, “And you’re going to Bode Thunder with Black Star and Soul?”

“...Yes?” The gut says this conversation is heading for trouble.

“Excellent. And, if I remember your paperwork, you have a vehicle and a clean driving record.”

Friendliness aside, now it’s just getting weird and personal. Maka supposes he does have her registration information for her parking permit, but her driving record doesn’t have much to do with anything except her insurance rate. “Uh… I guess that’s true, yeah.”

He finally drops the bomb: “I was wondering if I could join your carpool -- I’ll pay for gas -- assuming you’re not full yet.”

Technically she’s not, but her car isn’t that big, and they’re going to have to pack camping supplies. Also there’s the matter of Black Star and his incessant desire to have romantic weightlifting competitions with this guy, but it’s not like she wants to _lie._ “How much stuff do you have?”

“My bag is very compact,” Mortimer assures her. “Only the basics.”

Maka pushes her bangs back and wonders what Soul is going to think of his husband and his husband’s crush being crammed together in her coupe. “I guess that should work then. Yeah, I can take you.”

“My thanks. I apologize for the late inquiry. I was… persuaded to attend,” he says, looking mildly perplexed as if he, himself, wasn’t certain how such a thing had happened, “but with the short notice, I will not be able to use my father’s car.”

“It’s no problem, I’d feel bad just leaving someone stranded if I have a way to help. I guess Wes managed to convince you after all?”

Mortimer’s gaze is exceedingly blank. “Who?”

“W-Wes Evans. The guy who was at the barbecue? Who gave out tickets?”

“Oh, him,” he replies tonelessly, Maka feeling rather heartened from the man’s continued disinterest in the celebrity. “No, it was Black Star who persuaded me.”

_Uh oh._

Mortimer begins fiddling with the rings on his fingers. “I’m dismal at these sorts of things, but, you don’t suppose his husband would be troubled by my coming along, do you?”

 **_Uh oh._ ** Well, Soul will most definitely be troubled, but not for the reason Mortimer thinks he would. The building manager looks so genuinely distressed that Maka can’t help but root for him.

“I think you’ll be fine. Soul doesn’t seem like the kind of guy to get jealous over his partner having friends.”

At the mention of ‘friends’, Mortimer makes a faint movement with his face that uses _f_ _our_ smile muscles: a 100% increase since the potluck incident.

Sweat runs down Maka’s back-- she thinks she may have inadvertently added fuel to the fire just now. Mortimer nods, eager. “Of course. You’re right. Thank you, Maka. I’ll call you next week to confirm?” He whips out the biggest, flattest phone Maka has ever seen and starts scribbling with a stylus. Hopefully, he’s only jotting a schedule and getting ready to get her phone number, not making notes about how she looks like she’s just come off a bender.

Maka flails, one hand behind her trying to find her phone without opening the door all the way, but she comes up empty. It must still be in her coat pocket and not in its rightful place with her keys. Mortimer doesn’t seem too concerned with her odd dance, though. In fact he’s already on his way down the stairs. Maka blurts, “Don’t you need my number?”

He turns back, bemused, but regarding her politely. “Not if it’s the same one as is on record.”

Damn. Maka swears to never give out personal information flippantly ever again. “...Right. My mistake. Goodnight.”

Now she has to talk to Soul and break the news that they have a new carpool buddy. It’s inconvenient but it should be manageable, as long as Mortimer’s bag is as compact as he claims, and Black Star is… somehow knocked unconscious.

Soul doesn’t sound very excited about it. _[[can you come over? i wanna talk plans]]_ , he says. Maka sighs. She could theoretically put actual pants back on, or she could act like she doesn’t care and slob her way over. After taking a moment to consider how he’s already seen the bulk of her underwear collection, she just leaves as-is.

When Soul answers in pajamas, she knows she’s made the right choice. Though she’s back to self-conscious when she sees she’s not the only guest over. There’s a mystery girl with bright blonde hair and a bellybutton ring, surrounded by a slew of misshapen, bedazzled doll clothes. She lays on the floor, holding Snappy up in the air above her face making smoochy noises.

It takes her a moment, but Maka recognizes her as Patricia Thompson, from the barbecue.

“She needs to eat twice a day,” Black Star says from the couch, counting a list off his fingers. “Otherwise she gets cranky and starts chewing on the furniture.”

“You know she’s a reptile, right? She doesn’t need to eat that much, she’ll get gout,” the girl says from the floor.

“You take that back, she’s a growing girl.”

Maka has to put an end to the misconceptions. “She’s right -- alligators are cold blooded, and lower metabolic costs mean she doesn’t need to eat as often.”  

“Nerd alert, who invited Bill Nye?” Black Star snaps.

“I did,” Soul says, steering her past the mess on the floor, though she digs in her heels to stop just shy of the bedroom door.

“What’s going on?” Maka asks, crossing her arms and holding her ground. She is not a sheep to be herded around.

Soul rubs his temples. “How do I say this the short way,” he grumbles. “Star got this girl Patty to come watch the pets while we’re gone. She’s sworn to gator-secrecy. I guess he’s been buying custom clothes off her Etsy shop.”

What does it mean for her life choices if this explanation makes more sense than the majority of everything that’s happened the past few weeks?

“You’ve got a kitty too, doncha?” Patty says, setting the gator on the floor and standing up.

“Ugh,” Black Star grunts. “I guess Soul’s cat needs to eat too.”

Soul balks. “Hey, why is she my cat when you’re lazy, but your cat when you need Farmville freebies?”

His complaints falls on deaf ears; Black Star is already showing Patty into the bedroom to introduce her to Blair saying, “Careful, she’s a real pervert.”

With the living room vacated, Maka moves over to the couch. “...Well, it at least sounds like she knows what she’s doing,” Maka says. She’d trust pretty much anyone more than Black Star when it comes to responsibility, but Patty especially seemed knowledgeable about animals. “Anyway, you wanted to talk planning?”

“What did Mortimer ask you?” Soul hisses, closing the door to the bedroom where Patty could be heard cooing over the cat.

She wants to ask what all the whispering is about, but she remembers the alligator is the lesser of two secrets when in mixed company. “He just asked me if I was going to the music festival with you guys, and wanted to catch a ride. It’s… probably not a big deal, right?”

He gives Maka a dubious look as he joins her on the couch and leans over to scratch Snappy. The alligator turns her head, unsatisfied with anyone who isn’t her new favorite posh pet fashion designer. “This is fine. Everything is fine.”

“Black Star’s kept up the act for a year and a half, what’s three days?” Maka says, though she doesn’t know which of them she’s trying to reassure. “The drive isn’t even that long.”

* * *

 

Any drive would feel like a cross country road trip in this clown car. Mortimer’s suitcase is compact in the sense that all of his stuff fits inside one bag, but that’s only because it has the approximate dimensions of a household dishwasher. Consequently, it takes up the vast majority of the trunk, so the rest of their stuff is piled in a Great Wall of Camping separating Soul and Black Star. All small belongings are regulated to laps or behind knees, and Maka is infinitely thankful that she’s the one driving so she has space to breathe. The only thing she has to snuggle is her media badge and Kim’s precious camera hanging from her neck.

“Everyone buckled in?” she asks. It’s probably a moot point; if they crash, all of their stuff will just hold everyone in place and act as a makeshift airbag. Or sarcophagus.

Mortimer gives her the thumbs-up and a duet of disgruntled affirmative rings from the back seat. She turns out from the parking lot, the baggage wall immediately topples onto Soul, and they’re on their way.

Giving their building manager the auxiliary cord to the stereo results in a learning experience. It’s not Maka’s first introduction to ‘mathcore’, but listening to it in an enclosed environment in which she can not escape is like Mario-Karting through a surrealist hellscape. Black Star, on the other hand, thoroughly enjoys himself, drumming on the back of Mortimer’s seat and catching every screeching blare of the electric guitar with vocal imitations.

Maka focuses on the road with the skin of her teeth; she doesn’t want today to be the day that she ruins that perfect driving record Mortimer had been commending her for. Her eyes drift to the rear view mirror, despite her best efforts. Watching Black Star is both disturbing and oddly awe inspiring, but when she leans over to try to meet Soul’s eyes and maybe find some solidarity or a reminder that reality exists outside the Subaru, she gets nothing of the sort. He’s gone catatonic-- Soul ignores the world and embraces the sweet comfort of oblivion.

He seems to have accepted his fate of being crushed under the weight of their duffel bags. She should have known an audio engineer living with Black Star for an extended period of time would invest in noise-cancelling headphones, and Soul’s look state of the art. They must be, if they’re strong enough to drown out the off-beat chainsaw rips coming from the speakers.

There’s a brief respite during the intro of the next song, the resounding quiet ringing in her ears. It also brings to light just how heavily Black Star is breathing. She can almost admire the way he’s perfected the art of turning anything and everything into a workout.

“How are you liking this album?” Mortimer asks, taking advantage of the opening cello part to get a few words in.

“Heck yeah, man -- gets the blood pumping,” Black Star replies, revving up for the next round of inner-ear stabbing.

Occasionally there will be a fleeting lyric that sounds familiar, and Maka clings to these moments, though they are ripped out of her hands in a torrent of cymbals and unearthly screaming. What did Beyonce ever do to deserve having this done to her voice? “What is wrong with this remix?” she mutters.

Mortimer cuts the music volume in half. “Come again?”

He wasn’t supposed to hear that, especially over the noise. “Oh, nothing, just not the kind of music I usually listen to is all.”

“Ah.” Mortimer has really got the unimpressed tone nailed down to the single syllable level. “Should be an enlightening experience.”

Maka prepares for mental implosion as he returns to the volume knob and cranks it back up to heat-death-of-the-universe level. Thankfully, it only lasts a few dizzying measures before she feels a tap on her shoulder; Soul has risen from his coma and says something, but she can’t hear him over the din.

“What did you say?” she shouts back over her shoulder while eyeing the road.

“ _Hold still_ ,” he yells back. His hands ghost up either side of her face-- which is nerve wracking on its own-- but then something grazes her ear.

“Whoa, what are you doing?” Maka yelps, shaking him off.

Soul shouts, “Protecting your brain! You’ve got too much to lose,” and promptly holds her head and wiggles a pair of earplugs in.

“Oh,” she says, her voice now the loudest thing in her ears. That really is much better. Maybe not technically the best idea for driving, but the speakers are already at approximately the same decibel as a siren anyway. “Thanks,” she calls back.

“What?” Soul yells. He’s already returned to his headphones, this time with a pillow wrapped around his head as extra protection. Maka settles for just waving in the mirror.

She finally has an excuse to turn down the music when they pull up to the campsite and turn in the their passes in exchange for wrist bands. A festival worker directs them into a parking spot in the field, making them re-park three separate times to wedge them in as close as possible to the next car over.

“Come on, kids, squeeze in there, you want to make room for everyone,” she says, continually waving them over even as they approach bumping mirrors. “That’s better.”

Maka is tempted to jump out and punch the smug look off the lady’s face, but she doesn’t think she’s going to be able to get her door open. They’re all going to have to climb out the passenger side before the next car blocks them in and traps them forever. “Okay, let’s move,” Maka says, unbuckling so she’ll be ready to fling herself across the car.

Mortimer climbs out slower than she’d like, then commits his second great crime against her sanity: before Maka can make her escape, he slides the seat forward for Black Star first. Fine. This works too, as long as they _go._ Before anyone else can move, however, the festival lady comes back.

“You can pull in right here,” she says, gesturing directly to the space currently occupied by the open door. She turns to Mortimer with a crooked smile. “Move, darling.”

In shock, Mortimer slams the door inches from Black Star’s head and hop-skips behind the car, leaving them trapped while the next car pulls in. Their new nemesis walks away stroking her braid, ready to ruin someone else’s day. The next car has a hatchback so their neighbors have the benefit of being able to climb out the back, but Maka’s little coupe has no such luck.

The three of them sit in silence, weighing their options as more cars line up and the possibility of asking anyone to move over dwindles.

“Well,” Black Star says. “I guess we’ll have to punch our way through the windshield.”

“Touch the windshield and you won’t leave this car alive,” Maka warns, holding down the button for the sun roof. She stands up on the middle console and calls, “Mortimer, climb on the roof.” He doesn’t listen the first time--clearly questioning if she’s serious or not-- but a potently sour face has him climbing a moment later. “Careful with this.” Maka hands over the camera first, then directs Soul and Black Star to start handing up their stuff ala clown car conveyor belt.

Hauling their bags, tents, and supplies through the narrow window isn’t what would be considered light lifting, but it’s do or die. At first, Mortimer carries each item down to the ground, unwilling to carelessly toss anyone’s belongings, but by the fourth trip even his patience is worn thin and he starts sliding stuff off the back of the car into a heap.

True to Black Star’s account, Mortimer does not appear to have even broken a sweat once everything’s been hauled out of the car. Maka’s mouth twists with silent jealousy; her arms are burning, and she still has to haul _herself_ out. Maka braces her elbows and kicks off from the console, shimmying her way out. Mortimer reaches for her hand to help pull her up but she waves him off-- she has a very loud sense of pride to regain. Free of the metal death box (or maybe more appropriately death metal box), Maka climbs down and waves for the other two prisoners to follow suit.

Voice muffled, Black Star says. “You go first, in case I have to push your scraw-- sexy ass out.”

“You are the very definition of gentleman,” Soul deadpans, stepping up to the plate. His arms don’t do quite as well at supporting his weight. He gives it the old college try, but he’s tall, gangly, and angles are not working in his favor.

“Just put your knee up,” Black Star suggests, which is the best idea any of them have heard all day. Those long legs are put to good use getting extra traction on the roof when his arms just don’t cut it.

“Fuck this; fuck everything,” Soul says, crawling out into the light like a baby bear in spring. One of his hands starts to slip on the surface of the car and he over-corrects, rolling off the trunk and into the heap of supplies.

It’s unfortunate her camera wasn’t in her hands just then. “You okay?” Maka asks.

He takes her offered hand and hauls himself to his feet, infinitely more nimble on the ground. “A sleeping bag broke my fail, I’m good. Husband?” he calls.

Black Star pops up from the sunroof-gopherhole. He surveys his surroundings and for a clear path and leaps out in a single, olympic motion. “Tch.” He spikes his landing and lowers his arms. “You plebs should’ve let me go first, I could’ve shown you how it’s done.”

“Maybe you can show us how to set up the tents, then,” Soul says, flopping back to the ground, now on his own terms. After being cramped in the Subaru under all their stuff, he seems to only want to stretch out like a lazy cat.

Black Star can set up their own tent, but Maka will handle her own; she’s not willing to let him handle university property. As she digs through Junk Mountain, however, Mortimer manages to catch her attention with mere silence.

“Um, do you need something in here?” she asks, gesturing to the pile.

“My belongings, actually. In the trunk.”

“Oh! Sorry, yes--” The small _shed_ in her car that surely contains all of the building manager’s life possessions had actually slipped her mind. Popping the trunk, Maka watches Mortimer effortlessly lift the suitcase out of the compartment, as if completely empty.

Maka glances over her shoulder. Frowns at Black Star, who has become distracted mid-tent assembly. Caught red-handed, he laughs too loud and gets back to work, Soul drawling a constant stream of you’re-doing-it-wrong commentary.

She returns to searching for her own tent, but Mortimer has unzipped the suitcase and the curiosity is unbearable-- what kind of tent had he stuffed in there? A mansion? A spa-resort? Yet, all he retrieves is a compact thing, which effortlessly pops open into a black, coffin-style tent, with only just enough room to lay in. It’s clearly custom, as she doesn’t suspect one can walk into an Academy and find a one-man tent with **‘DEATH’** emblazoned across the top in holographic letters.

Mortimer zips up the suitcase, which may actually be bigger than his sleeping quarters. Maka keeps her frustrated shrieking internal. With that lead exhausted, she resolves to finding her belongings once more. It’s been awhile since she’d last done any camping-- she used to enjoy it, but somehow it had faded into the background of her routine until she had forgotten about doing anything for leisure.

Finding the university bag, it occurs to her that, despite the weirdness of the past several weeks, Maka has rather enjoyed having things to do with other people. She really needs to pull Soul aside and thank him for looking out for her so much.

Pleased at the prospect of having something interesting to report to Mama, she unzips the tent bag and promptly sticks her hand into an alarmingly pungent mess.

The string of expletives she puts together calls all three men to wander hesitantly over to her, witness as she pulls out a melted wad of tent fabric smelling to high heaven of bug spray.

Soul asks, “Is-- Is it just stuck together?”

Maka pries folds of the tent apart to reveal _holes_ eaten through the walls.

“Negative,” Mortimer needlessly answers. Meanwhile, Black Star takes one look at Maka’s face and just starts laughing.

She gives the carcass a little shake, and the murder weapon--a cracked bottle of deet-- rolls to the ground. A few moments with his ridiculous phablet, and Mortimer reports deet commonly eats through breathable laminates.

Maka should have just bought her own gear. “Don’t suppose any of you have an extra tent?”

The silence is telling enough.

“I would offer you mine,” Mortimer says, taking a moment to look at the **DEATH** coffin, then adds, anticlimactic, “but I won’t.”

“I guess I could try sleeping in the car…” But the prospect of climbing in and out of the sunroof any more than she must is less than heartening.

A friendly arm wraps behind her neck, approximately eighty pounds of swolebro bicep compressing her spine. “Don’t worry about it, Maks--”

 _“Max?”_ she murmurs to herself, alarmed.

Black Star hooks his other arm around Soul’s neck and brings him in close like a happy family. “You can stay with us~”

Doing his best to not look like everyone around him has suddenly sprouted seven extra heads, Soul says, “Uh. I can chill in the car or whatever--”

“Nonsense, sweetcheeks! We have room, and Maka’s a _close friend--_ honestly, the best third wheel two husbands could ask for.”

“I still can’t tell if that’s a backhanded compliment or not,” Maka says as Black Star leads the three of them away from Mortimer and to his and Soul’s tent.

Once out of immediate earshot, Black Star says in a voice so quiet that Maka is actually a little proud: “Listen chumps, you told me to be inconspicuous, so I’m trying to look  _married,_ okay? It’d be suspicious as hell if me and Soul aren’t sharing, but I imagine _you_ don’t wanna sleep outside alone, yeah?”

“W-well,” Maka stammers, “yeah.”

“ _Suck it up, then._ And no adultery-- if I can’t touch the butt, neither can either of you.” And then he loudly smacks a kiss on Soul’s cheek for good measure before letting them go.

Maka hears Soul mutter something that sounds like a mantra of ‘only one semester, only one semester’, before he growls out, “If he thinks we’re swingers, I blame you.”

Unfazed, Black Star returns to the mess of their tangled tent and says, “Then I blame Maks.”

She supposes ‘Maks’ is a better nickname than the stuff her father comes up with, at least. “I blame university for every bit of this,” she sighs. “What the _hell_ have you done to these poles?” she demands, stomping over to help.

* * *

With the tent set up, they’re left to sit on their hands and regret not bringing folding chairs. The camps around them all had the foresight to bring shade canopies and seats, but the only one among them with anything is Mortimer. Unsurprisingly, he had fit a boat cushion into his so-called compact bag.

“Well, this is swell,” Black Star says, rifling through his bag for some knock-off sunglasses to complete his frat boy at a rave look. “What now?”

Maka pulls out her festival pamphlet and hopes for something to jump out at her, but the whole thing doesn’t seem to start until tomorrow. “I don’t think there’s any music today.”

Soul growls when he hears that. “Why did Wes tell us to come today, then?”

“Sounds like someone’s hangry.” A well-aimed Snickers bar flies past Maka and smacks Soul in the face. Black Star reaches to pinch Soul’s cheeks. “Maybe baby needs a timeout. I for one am glad to be early, not camped out in the next pasture with the cows.”

Soul doesn’t deign a response. Not giving a reaction appears to be the best way to be left alone, and Black Star gives up, quickly leaving them back where they started: tired and hot with nothing but itchy grass to sit on. What a fun bonding experience this is turning out to be.

“I could definitely eat,” Maka says. She doesn’t have much of an appetite, but food is a surefire way to break some awkward tension. She pulls the camera out from where Mortimer had tucked it neatly under the car. “We could walk around, check things out -- I could start getting pictures for the newspaper.”

At least she can always count on Black Star for a little enthusiasm. “My girl Maks knows what’s up. I’m gonna find some kickass curly fries. Anyone who isn’t a _big whiner_ may join my quest,” he says, complete with pointed stare in Soul’s direction until the group is on their feet.  

The promise of fried food and heartburn lies in the distance; all they have to do is navigate a tightly packed sea of cars, tents, and day-drinkers to get to it. There’s no squeezing past any of the cars with the way that attendant had sardined them, so they’re forced to pick their way through people's campsites to get to a walkway. Everything is so uniform, Maka has no idea how they’re going to find their way back to her car, especially in the dark. The closest thing she can find to a landmark is a nearby flag with an anteater in a top hat. She can’t imagine there being more than one of those.

The Bode Thunder crowd is a mixed bag of people trying to make the best out of not being at Coachella. For every face-painted college girl, there’s an equally face-painted old guy with too many scarves. About halfway between their tents and the promised land, a.k.a. the vendor’s row, Maka hears one voice that makes her blood run cold.

“Angel face!” There’s only one man she knows with a dye job as vibrant as Black Star’s. Her father comes leaping over some sorry soul’s lawn chair like an olympic hurdle. It figures he would be one of the weird Misplaced Adults™ at a place like this. Spirit Albarn makes it to them with no small effort; he’s bent over at the waist and panting from the exertion. But then he gets one look at the company she’s in and straightens up to full height. “Maka, who are all these _boys_ you’re with.”

It might be entertaining to declare everyone single one of them as her boyfriend and watch her father’s eyes bulge out of his head, but that might have some repercussions down the line. Maka blurts the next best thing that comes to mind. “Dad, they’re grown men. Also, they’re gay.”

It’s only after she says it that she realizes that it’s both a blatant lie about Soul and a completely unfounded claim about Mortimer, but neither one corrects her. Her father just looks between the four of them like they’ve invited him to a cult and says, “Sweetie, that doesn’t mean anything. Boys are scoundrels no matter their preferences.”

The strangled laugh at the word ‘scoundrel’ from Soul does not make this situation any better. Maka grunts, unimpressed. “Okay Papa, thanks for the pep talk. Bye,” she says, turning on a heel to walk away.

“Wait, wait,” he says, speed-walking alongside their group. “Where are you camped? We’ll come over to you.”

“We?” Maka asks. “You and what army?”

“You remember Dr. Stein.”

How could she ever forget. When she was five, she thought she wanted to be a vet and Dr. Stein had dashed those dreams with a single demonstration of a neutering procedure. Even if Maka would be fine camping near her father, she doesn’t think she’d feel safe sleeping with that man around. She ignores his request for their location and keeps walking.

“C’mon,” her dad says, verging into wailing territory as he gets increasingly upset. “We haven’t camped together since you were little -- I can make you pancakes.”

“Pancakes?” Black Star perks up. _He wouldn’t dare._ “We’re over by the weird anteater flag.”

Only Spirit would respond with finger guns. “Thank you, my friend,” he says, jogging backwards. “You will be repaid. I brought blueberries!”

As soon as he’s out of sight, Maka smacks Black Star on the shoulder. “How could you?”

“I just want the pancakes,” he says, shrugging her off. “Besides, he seems like a cool dude.”

Cool? Her dad? Maka stews her way ahead, vowing to buy out the curly fries and eat every single one before Black Star can get any. That dream may just a little out of reach, though; the vendor’s row looks like it’s outfitted to feed an army-- if an army can be sustained solely on fried food and smoothies.

There’s beer too, and all kinds of overpriced Bode Thunder merchandise being sold right next to the beer to maximize drunken buying decisions. Maka could probably be swayed to buy some of the workout clothes being sold in the next stall over, though, especially if she tells herself that they would make her butt look as good as the sales girl’s. That’s the kind of rear Maka spends pilates class envying, and if she didn’t know any better she’d swear it looks familiar.  

“Nakatsukasa!” Black Star whoops. Tsubaki turns, waves, catches Maka’s eye, and smiles her blinding camera-ready smile. Her butt-radar was right after all. If this keeps up, Maka is going to run into all ten people she knows before they even go to any shows.

Ever her biggest fan, Black Star jogs over to Tsubaki to get her to autograph his bicep, probably. “Hey, Tsubaki,” she says, trying her best to stand closer to Soul and Kid and further from the Disaster.  

“Maka, I didn’t know you guys were friends outside of class.”

Her instinct is to scream. She doesn’t know this person. They are _not_ friendly and they are definitely not forcibly sharing a tent.

“Yep.” Black Star slings his arm around Maka’s shoulder. “Me and Maks go way back." No, they don't. "And what is your fine self up to this lovely afternoon? Getting extra squats in?”

“You always say the funniest things.” That’s a polite way to put it. “One of my Instagram sponsors is here and offered me free tickets to come promote the brand. I’m leading a belly dancing class too -- you guys should come by.”  

“Abdominal isolations? I am so there,” Black Star says, lifting his shirt and undulating at absolutely no one’s request.

If Maka could cringe any harder, her body would implode in on itself. She looks to Soul for some solidarity but he’s gone and wandered off to eat like any sane person would. Tsubaki must be so used to weirdos, she doesn’t even bat an eye, just nods and says encouragingly, “Clearly the Pilates have been paying off.”

“It really is a practiced skill,” Mortimer points out.

Maka has no allies in these dark times.

“See, Morty gets it. Don’t you want a piece of these rippling abs, Maka?” Black Star says, turning to her with his disturbingly quivering six pack.

She needs to eat something, fast, before she loses her appetite. Smoothies from a booth sounds like a mistake so Maka sets her sights on a gyro stand and ducks out from under Black Star's arm. “It was good to see you, Tsu, I’ll see you guys back at the campsite.” It’s every woman for herself.

Maka gets her food and finds Soul sitting on a bench polishing off the last couple bites of pizza. “Good move, ditching the circus,” she says, sitting down a safe distance down. Everyone has had a trying day and she doesn’t need to push things with the one person she’s counting on being reasonable.

“This whole place is a circus, but at least the lemonade is good,” he says, offering her a sip. “Star can talk about workout junk forever, it’s like the one thing he takes seriously.”

“I’m guessing that’s what he’s in school for?” It’s hard to picture him in class but in Maka’s experience, he’s hardly ever in the apartment and that time can’t _all_ be at the gym.

“Yeah. Kinesthesiology. He’s always wanted to do physical therapy for kids, get them able to be active and stuff.”

It’s certainly a worthwhile goal, and kinesthesiology degrees aren’t smooth sailing either. Maka nods, quiet. There’s a lot she still doesn’t know about their relationship, but she can tell it’s a close one despite the surface tension. She clenches her fists, crumpling her foil wrapper in the process.  “You ready go to back to the campsite?”

“Do you suppose any chairs have shown up while we’re gone?”

“Doubtful.”

“Maybe we should walk around a bit more, then. You wanted to take some pictures?” Soul gestures to the camera around her neck. “I’ll text Star and tell him we’ll meet them back there later. He and Mortimer seem to be...not making out, for now.”

Maka follows Soul’s gaze back to the sports apparel tent where Mortimer and Tsubaki analyze the latest set of workout clothes Black Star presently models. “Sounds like a plan.”

The festival is in a pretty spot once they get out of the crowded tent-scape of the fields. The stages are set up across a charming little creek, and the late afternoon light is good for scenery. Soul leads her around and she gets a few shots of the setup process before the sun starts to set, and they make their way back to their sad little campsite as night falls.

Something is off when they get back. Black Star is sitting and chatting with their neighbors, which wouldn’t be strange in itself, but Maka swears that canopy tent was not there before. As they get closer, her stomach drops as she recognizes her father’s car-- how had not only convinced complete strangers to switch spots, but also not run over campsites on the way here?

Not only that, but he’s parked so well that she has enough room on the side of her car to squeeze through a door if she needed to. Being able to shut the sunroof and have a place to lock up valuables like Kim’s camera is a grudgingly great turn of events.

“Welcome back.” Black Star waves. “Check it, we have chairs now! And light.”

True enough, Spirit and Stein have brought over their entire pimped-out campsite and appear willing to share, but at what cost? “What are you doing here?” Maka asks.

“I told you I would come over to camp with you,” Spirit says, making himself at home setting up a grill. “Now, who wants hamburgers?”

Even Maka’s own stomach betrays her with a vocal gurgle despite having been fed only a couple hours ago.

All her planning hadn’t been enough-- her father and his college roommate had to show up, winning over her friends with luxuries. She hates the canopy and the twinkle lights, the good food and cold beer, and especially the inflatable couch she’s currently dozing off on. To cap it off, he’s now telling them embarrassing stories from her childhood and she’d like to put a ban on him speaking, but everyone seems to be enjoying themselves and it’s contagious.

Once he starts talking about that time she been kicked out of singing lessons, that’s her cue to leave. “Well, I’m going to bed,” Maka announces, struggling to detach herself from the couch blob. If she finds those earplugs again maybe she can block out the nonsense.     

“So soon, Ma-cakes?” her dad protests, one beer past sentimental and fast approaching blubbering. “We were having such a good time bonding -- even if you are too young to be drinking.”

She should’ve known it would turn into a nostalgia-fest. “I’m twenty two, Dad,” she calls as she walks to the nearest spigot to wash her face before flopping into the tent. The earplugs help muffle the sounds of so many people in so little space, but she can still hear the murmur of Spirit charming her friends without her, and though it makes it hard to sleep, it brings a lot of blurry memories of camping when she was younger.

The tent zipper pulls her out of a doze-- Soul and Black Star have finally decided to pass out. She buries her face in her sleeping bag to avoid being blinded by a flashlight.

“Sorry,” she hears Soul’s gravelly voice through the earplugs, then feels a shift in the tent as he crawls in. “You asleep?”

“Mmf,” she mumbles, now wide awake.

“Scoot in. Make room for Jesus.” She can’t forget for just one second that Black Star is crowding in too.

Soul apologizes again and nudges her. Maka tries her best to wiggle closer to the wall of the tent but inevitably ends up with her face smashed against the mesh. The only bright side is that she’s not in the middle -- Soul has taken that one for the team. “Black Star kicks in his sleep,” he mutters, and her heart flutters against her will. His breath is hot on her ear for just a second before he rolls over and they’re pressed together back to back. It’s hard enough for Maka to sleep so close to someone else in general, but she didn’t realize how much worse it would be with someone she’s actually attracted to.

Having Soul’s husband a foot away does do the job she’d expected, though: there’s no room to even entertain thoughts of romance once Black Star falls asleep and twists around like he’s punching someone out in his dreams. Soul buffers his tossing and turning as much as he can, but a stray leg inevitably flings out into space over the top of him and collides with Maka’s knees.

It’s a long and restless night, and only gets less comfortable when the sun comes up and converts the tent into a sauna. Soul actually seems like he’d reached the bliss of unconsciousness, noise cancelling headphones and all, and Maka doesn’t _want_ to wake him up, but she needs out of here and her only escape route is to crawl over both boys to the exit flap. They both appear to be dead sleepers, thankfully. Once she can breathe again, she collapses onto the blowup couch and prays for deliverance.

Unfortunately, her pseudo-uncle Stein is sprawled in a lawn chair enjoying some early-morning coffee, and he has other ideas. “You have an earplugs stuck in your hair.” His slow, deep laughter is the soundtrack to her blindly combing through her tangled hair for the damned things. “Welcome to the festival experience,” he says.

Maka grunts into fake-suede vinyl, clutching the earplugs in her hand because she doesn’t know where to put them but is unwilling to lose them. “I’m surprised to see you here. I can’t even imagine you at a concert.”

“Appearances are always deceiving,” he says with the smile that drove her out of dreams of veterinary school.

This is when her father steps out of his tent. “Good morning, Gumdrop,” Spirit says, looking enviably well rested. “Pancakes?”

Staying up all night is hard on the metabolism. “Yes,” Maka answers pitifully, thawed a couple degrees by the prospect of food and willing to give in to being spoiled.

The smell of pancakes draws the boys out of their tents like a pack of messy-haired zombies, and there’s something disconcerting about seeing their usually well-dressed building manager wearing a tank top in a light enough grey that it almost seems white compared to his usual attire.

“Mornin’, Morty.” Black Star yawns.

Mortimer glares back, apparently a little touchy pre-caffeine, and in a perfect rendition of Black Star’s tone, repeats back, “Mornin’ Bart.”

Maka vows to deliver coffee to his hands before anymore damage can occur. Fortunately, Stein seems to have them well supplied, already pouring some into reusable cups from a carafe. “So what’s the plan today,” she asks no one in particular.

“Wes goes on at one, if you want to see him,” Soul says, sitting on the other end of the couch.

“Isn’t that kind of the point-- nevermind.” She shouldn’t be surprised that he’s still a little bitter over the harassment. Surely, deep down Soul wants to support his brother, elsewise he’d just refuse to go. “And then what’s after that? You said you’d pick out a schedule.”

He makes one sluggish blink before waking up a little further. “Uh, yeah, it’s somewhere around here.” It takes a minute to search through everything on the card table between the actual cards and beer cans, but he finds a full timetable of the festival with sections highlighted and annotated. “I went through and put together a variety -- all the good stuff but a mix of genres so it should be good for your review.”

She takes the schedule and glances over it: everything is color-coded and prioritized, looking more like something she’d put together than what she’s come to expect from Soul. The engineer in him has reared its head. “Wow,” Maka says. “This is amazing.”

Soul scratches the back of his neck, playing with the wispy strands of hair there. A tint of pink crawls up his skin, though it’s unclear if it’s just from him rubbing it or if he just can’t take a compliment. “I tried.”

“Hey sweet potato.” Never one to pass up a Moment, Black Star wedges himself between them and snags the schedule out of Maka’s hands. “Lemme see what bullshit you’ve got us going to. Limozeen? Laaame.”  

Maka grabs the paper back before her father can get a hold of it and decide to stalk her around the place. “So we’re just hanging out until then?” She looks at her watch, figuring it has to be getting close to noon, but thanks to an early morning wake-up call from the sun, it’s still only nine.

Not too early for Spirit Albarn to crack open a beer. That seems to be the plan of action of most everyone around them, though, if you ignore the wackjobs huffing from whipped cream dispensers. While Maka would love to get some pictures of festival camping, she doesn’t think blatant public drug use would be very newspaper appropriate. Time crawls by spent eating potato chips and playing easygoing card games. Maka dozes off and on through the morning, making up for lost sleep until it’s time to make the hike into the venue. Spirit sends them off with a smile and Maka dodges his last-minute question of where they’re headed.

The field in front of the mainstage is already swarming by the time they get there. Barriers are set up in front, and Maka can see where the media badge comes in handy to get up close and personal for pictures. Soul swerves completely off-course, instead leading them off to the side and behind the stage. And security staff is not keen on that.

“Woah, there, bucko,” a tall man with a bridge piercing stops Soul with a firm palm to the chest. “Where d’you think you’re headed?”  

“My brother’s playing next,” Soul tries to explain, clearly finding being touched abhorrent and not bothering to hide it.

“Yeah? You got ID? A VIP pass?”

Soul snaps. “Are you kidding me? Look at my face, do you not see the resemblance? Go ask him.”

“Can’t say I do.” Power Trip sneers. “Move along there. No groupies.”

“Picture this with an undercut and overdone contours.” Soul gestures wildly to his whole face, straightening his shoulders as much as he can, but the security guard isn’t even paying attention. He goes straight back to staring at his phone, and as Maka debates on whether or not they could just make a break past him, a familiar face comes to the rescue.

Harvar surveys them from behind the gate to the stage. “Send them up, Giriko,” he says with a sigh like he can’t be bothered if they make it or not. “Mr. Evans won’t be happy to hear you were detaining his only brother.”  

“So sorry, Monsieur D’Eclair.” He waves them past with a mimed hat-tip. The man says Harvar’s surname more like ‘dick layer’ but they politely ignore it until they’re up the metal stairs at which point Black Star flips a double bird behind him.  

“I’m sure Wes will be so thrilled to see you all,” Harvar says, leading them to the makeshift backstage lounge. “Mr. Evans, look who came to see you. The other Mr. Evans, so exciting.”

Maka can cough with more emotion.

“Look at you all,” Wes declares, standing with a flourish. His face is legitimately glowing with highlighter and Maka worries once there are stage lights on him that there may be risk of epilepsy in the audience. He waves a delicate hello to each of them, but when his eyes land on Mortimer, it’s clear who's the star attraction. “Oh, I’m so glad you decided to come along,” Wes says, reaching for the other man’s hand to no avail.

Mortimer takes a fraction of a step backwards. “Sorry, I’m allergic to glitter.”

“Oh, well that is truly unfortunate. Maka, I see you brought a camera? Do you need another interview? Some glamour shots?” Wes starts a sequence of poses complete with unfriendly-hottie-chic faces.    

“Pictures wouldn’t be a bad idea,” she answers. They could be good bribe material for Kim, whether she puts them in the paper or not. Maka snaps a few pictures to get a range, then snaps a few more to satisfy Wes’s rampant urge to model. “Great, perfect,” she says. It doesn’t take a genius to realize the man subsists on flattery.

“You are too sweet,” Wes says, pinching her cheek and no doubt leaving a trail of shimmer behind. She could probably get a full makeover just standing next to him and waiting for the fallout. “Of course you’re welcome to watch the show from the wings to get my best angle. Make sure to send those to me on Facebook for media release approval.”

He always has to put the catch in the sweetest voice. It would be a good opportunity to get an exclusive shot. Maka looks to Soul for approval and he shrugs his assent. “Sounds like a plan, we’ll be out in the grass,” he says. “How soon until you go on?”

Wes looks at his wrist for a watch that’s never there. “You came just after the sound check, so--”  

“Eleven minutes,” Harvar fills in. “I’d go find a good spot.”

“Goodness, I better touch up my powder, make sure I’m not shiny,” Wes says, whisking away to a decked-out makeup vanity. Make knows, objectively, that there’s a fine line between ‘glow’ and ‘sweaty’, but she can’t begin to know where it is. Harvar sends the boys off from the opposite side they came in, everyone eager to avoid another run in with bad attitude dude.    

That leaves Maka with Wes’s ever-sardonic personal assistant. All she can hope for is to be able to tell if he’s making any jokes at her expense. Mostly he’s quiet, standing in the wings with his headset on, giving cues. He’s apparently his own type of one-man show, orchestrating everything that orbits around his boss.

Strobe lights flash as Wes takes the stage, taking the risk of seizure up the next level, and Maka is forced to take pictures in quick succession and hope she catches some with the lights on. In a brief breath between songs, Harvar mutters something away from his headset, but Maka doesn’t realize it was directed towards her until it’s too late.

“What did you say?” she yells over the applause.

Harvar leans in close to her ear this time. “I said, you’ve gotten yourself involved with an interesting family, Ms. Albarn.”  

She doesn’t know if that’s supposed to be a warning, a threat, or something else entirely, so she waits to see if he’s going to say anything else for himself. “I just hope you’re not in it for the money; Soul has always been oversensitive.”

“Excuse me?” This is getting entirely uncalled for. Maka already has enough fears of people thinking she’s a homewrecking hussy without _Harvar_ breathing down her neck. The question is whether or not he’s also in on the secret or not.

“The Evanses.” He gestures to the resident glitter fairy on stage. “You don’t think he got this way solely from talent, do you?”

Perhaps not. At least half of Wes’s advantage is confidence and stage presence, which can often go further than raw talent in the music industry. His voice certainly isn’t bad, but it’s also not the stuff of viral YouTube videos rocketing some nobody to stardom overnight. “I’m guessing not?”

“You really haven’t done your homework.” Maka can hear the eyeroll even from behind those blackout shades. “The whole family is big in the music industry. Their mother is some hotshot producer.”

The fancy car and the full time assistant explain why Wes is the way he is, but not much pops up that screams wealth when she thinks of Soul, except maybe his motorcycle. Maka frowns, letting her camera dangle from her neck while she tries to parse out the information she has. She’d come across other Evanses in her interview research, but family money and influence hadn’t been at the forefront of her thoughts at the time.

Filling in that piece of the puzzle begs one question, though: what use could Soul possibly have for extra scholarship benefits if his family is loaded?

Wes ends his set to the tune of shrieking fans of all genders, and prances back to the wings. “Donut, my handkerchief.”

Harvar procures one from his pocket and hands it over for Wes to wipe his face. Takes it back saturated with glitter, and safely delivers this into a plastic bag.

Maybe it’s sweat or maybe it’s Maybelline but somehow Wes sparkles even more than before. “Enjoy the show, Maka?” he asks breathlessly, fanning his face to little effect. “Get good pictures?”

Maka answers automatically, “Yes, it was great,” even though she’d been a little preoccupied once Harvar started dropping bombs. She leaves with a promise of putting him in the review, and meets Soul, Star, and Mortimer next to some bougie dumpling truck, trying her best to put what Harv had told her in the back of her mind so she can enjoy this time with her friends.

“Get what you wanted?” Soul asks.

She nods. She got enough pictures of Wes to satisfy Kim from now until graduation, so by all technicalities, yes, she got what she wanted. Just also got more than she’d bargained for.

According to Soul, there isn’t anything else worthwhile until six, so they might as well go back to the campsite to get some rest if they’re going to be up late again. Maka can’t say she’d complain about a nap. Stein and Spirit are back too, having gone to see some long-winded band whose name makes Soul cringe upon impact.

“How was your concert, Maka?” her father asks, sidling up to straighten her hair.    

She’s too distracted to act inconvenienced and just answers, “Fine.” When this isn’t enough to appease him and he raises her chin for a worried look, she says, “Just thinking, Dad.” He doesn’t press any further, which might be considered a small miracle, and gives her a supportive pat on the head.

The afternoon passes in a haze; Maka drags her sleeping bag out of the tent and ends up dozing in the grass, watched over by Stein as the resident flock guardian and oddly lulled by the surrounding white noise of activity and ambient marijuana smell.

She wakes up ravenous, realizing her last meal was morning pancakes. Most everyone else has taken up the afternoon napping too, Mortimer in his tent, Black Star sprawled on the couch, and Soul curled up in the patch of shade behind the car. Stein is left playing solitaire at the card table with a cigarette perched on his lips, so Spirit must also either be asleep or off philandering.

“Good afternoon,” Stein says. “Comfortable sleeping on the ground?”

“Yeah.” Maka blinks and rubs her eyes, slightly blinded by the angle of the sun streaming in the unprotected sides of the canopy. “Too hot in the tent.”

Her stomach complains, and Stein fishes in his pocket to draw out a set of keys. “There’s snacks in the hatch,” he says. “I think your father intended on having extra company.”

Figures. But if Stein isn’t enough of a deterrent, Maka certainly is; Spirit won’t bring any women around as long as she’s right there. He should still be in the habit of keeping his affairs out of the domicile courtesy of old custody agreements.

Maka opens the hatch and starts a hunt for chocolate. Potato chips, corn chips, pita chips-- the first bag proves unhelpful for her cravings. In a tupperware, tucked down where no one was probably supposed to find them, her father has hidden some brownies. He’d always liked hoarding them all for himself.

Surely he won’t notice if she eats one or two. Making sure her father isn’t standing behind her, she wolfs them down at Black Star-regulated speeds, packs the rest back into the bottom of the bag, and grabs some tortilla chips for the road.

An hour goes by and then the world goes a little sideways.

* * *

Soul finds the methodical way Maka has been eating for the past half hour concerning. Not that she shouldn’t eat as much as she likes, but it’s a little out of character and she’s going to hit the bottom of that bag of chips soon. He believes it is time for some investigation.

“You doing okay over here?” He nudges her feet to the side so he can fit on the couch.

Letting the bag fall to the ground, she mutters, “My chips are gone."

“I can see that.”

Maka smacks her tongue and frowns. “And my mouth is dry as hell.”

Hopefully that’s just from the salt, because if he didn’t know any better, he’d say that she was high. This calls for an expert. “Hey, Black Star,” Soul waves over his roommate from going through Mortimer’s archaic CD collection.

“What’s up?” Black Star plops down between them on the couch, slinging an arm over either one of them. Maka’s lack of reaction to this is a telling sign.

Spirit is up and about and Soul doesn’t want to get Maka in trouble when the guy already seems on the overprotective side, so he leans in close to whisper, “D’you think Maka's blazed?”

Black Star turns and cups Maka’s chin, tilting her head from side to side. “Definitely.”

She frowns. “Definitely what?”

“Baked, skunked, stoney baloney,” Black Star says. He peers into her bloodshot eyes as he gives his official diagnosis. “Put away the reefer, Maks.”

“I have _not_ been smoking,” Maka says. “I think I would’ve _noticed.”_

She certainly has no concept or control over her volume. It’s a good thing Spirit is too busy chatting up some wandering visitors to notice his daughter professing she isn’t high as a kite while looking like she may just float away if Black Star didn’t have an arm over her shoulders.

Stein’s attention is caught, however. “Maka,” the doctor says, peering over his glasses and initiating a long chain of sentences ending in question marks. “When I told you there were snacks in the car, what did you eat?”

Maka squints like remembering the last hour is trying to recall a dream. “Uh… these chips?” she says, holding up the now empty bag.

“And?” Stein prompts.

After a moment of hesitation, she adds, “A coupla brownies?”

Soul blurts, “Oh my god, seriously, you guys?”

Stein’s eyebrows shoot up as his current cigarette falls from his mouth. “You ate more than one?”

“Yes?” she squeaks.

Retrieving his cigarette, the doctor flicks his eyes towards the car, then over to where her father is off chatting to a pair of good-natured frat bros. “Interesting. You know your father can’t know about this.”   

“What?” Her voice just keeps getting higher as realization dawns. “I’m high? I can’t be -- what if I get drug tested?”

“That’s highly unlikely. Don’t worry, it’s not permanent,” Stein says, a little too casual and amused for Soul’s comfort. He scrunches his eyebrows and glances at the ever growing pile of cigarette stubs building next to the man. And then, the epiphany: the constant bud smell hasn’t been coming from the surrounding campsites but from an inside source.

“So, important question,” Black Star says, eerily serious, “how many curly fries do you want right now?”

Maka’s eyes go comically large, unable to find a number large enough.

“Well, these nice gentlemen invited us over for some social face painting,” Spirit announces, twirling back around on one of the canopy poles. Then he catches a look at Maka hunched over with her head in her hands and Soul tries to convey for her to act fucking natural through a discrete shoulder tap. “Everything alright, sweetie?”

She pops up. “Everything is fine, Papa, no facepaint for me. Okaythanksbye.”

Spirit doesn’t sound totally convinced, but Stein waves him off. “All right, I’ll be back later.”

Maka slumps back down as soon as her father is out of sight, blasting through stages of denial and bargaining straight to acceptance. “I’m high,” she mutters. “I’m baked and I gotta take notes for that review tonight.”

“What’s going on?” Shit, Mortimer has noticed the group conspiracy and come over to assess the situation. While hanging out with him so far has been mostly fine-- barring his off-putting taste in music-- he’s still been pretty uptight. It doesn’t help that he’s the son of their landlord and they don’t need to be put under close watch if he thinks they’re a pack of stoners.

“I suspect Maka may have unintentionally consumed some… medicinal herbs of mine,” Stein says matter-of-factly before anyone can come up with an excuse.

“So now she’s faded out of her mind,” Black Star adds without a shred of sympathy.

Mortimer’s eye definitely twitches, but he keeps any horrified words to himself, instead extending his condolences. “That sounds unfortunate.”

Meanwhile, Maka has evolved to hanging her head down so her hair dangles to the ground. Someone has to do something about this. “Don’t worry about it, Maka,” Soul says, hand hovering above her shoulder, unsure if patting is appropriate. “It’ll pass. Besides, wouldn’t be the worst way to go to some concerts. I mean, _some people_ do this on purpose,” he says, looking pointedly at the doctor.

Stein blows a cloud of smoke.

At the very least, Soul’s encouragements unfold her by just a couple degrees so that her forehead is pressed to one knee. “I wouldn’t be so worried if I didn’t have this work stuff to deal with.”

“What do you have to do for it?” Mortimer asks.

“Only take pictures at the shows and remember enough to write an article,” she answers. “But I can’t focus on anything, and now that I _know,_ I can’t _stop thinking about it._ ”

Soul asks, “Maybe I can help?” It shouldn’t be too hard for him to help with the reviewing part. He’s not the best with words, but he’d like to think he knows how to talk about music. Between the two of them, that’d be manageable. He’s less confident in his camera abilities, though.

Fortunately before he can over-commit, Mortimer offers. “Where is your camera? I can take the pictures if you need.”

“I put it in the console in the car,” she says. “You guys would really do that? Man, that’s the nicest thing.”

Soul says, “Totally, it’ll be fine. Now are you guys about ready to go? Tezca is going to be on soon, it’s not my style but he’s been blowing up online so it’d be worthwhile.”

“Yeah.” Rallying to face the evening, Maka rubs her face and stands, wobbling for a second. “Woah. Head rush.”

The lingering Hover-Hand™ strikes again as Soul reaches to steady her, but withdraws when she doesn’t fall back. “You good?”

“Mhm,” she hums, distracted by scrolling through her phone. “Can we stop and get some lemonade on the way, though? My mouth still feels like I licked a dusty bookshelf.”

It takes a little nudging, but Maka gets her shoes on and her stuff together so they’re ready to head out (minus Stein, who stays behind to wait for Maka’s errant father). Mortimer holds back a little, though. “I actually have to meet with someone first, but I’ll see you guys at the Tezca show,” he says. “Maka, can you get me the camera and your media pass?”

Hyper-aware of herself, Maka slithers inside the car though the tiny gap she can make opening the door, grabs the pass and the camera and hands them over, her fingers faltering and hesitant to let go. “I’m counting on you,” Maka says, and Mortimer takes them from her with a solemn nod.

“Fear not.”

The walk down to the venues seems even longer this time, or maybe Soul is just stressed out about now being in a herd of people all going to the same place with Maka commenting on the texture of literally everything. He’d like to find a place in the back to just settle in and not get his feet stomped on when an inevitable mosh pit breaks out. He wasn’t kidding when he said Tezca wasn’t his style -- it can be a little heavy on the screamo --  but he has such a cult following it seems like a crime to skip it. Besides, it rounds out the schedule without Soul having to miss anything he really _wants_ to see.

They find a spot far enough back to avoid the worst of the jostling but close enough to still see. A fog machine sends smoke rolling down the stage in waves, lighting up gold in the sunset.

Maka tugs on Soul’s sleeve. “Have you seen Mort yet?”

“I can text him where we’re at,” Black Star says, whipping his phone out. Soul numbly accepts the fact that they’re on a texting basis now. Maka just bounces on her toes and glances around desperately for the last member of their party. Then the spotlights come on and a man with his face hidden by an enormous head of a bear walks on stage, a weird mix of Disney theme park mascot and Daft Punk homage.     

“Hello, Bode Thunder,” he says, voice deep and gravelly in the microphone. The crowd in front of them comes to life with shouts and cracking glowsticks. “This is a new one we’ve been working on-- it’s called ‘Chainsaw Massacre.’ The lights shut off for a moment, coming back in ghostly red, and then the shred of an actual chainsaw starts off the show.

Soul instantly regrets not bringing his noise cancelling headphones. It’s not even the screamo that kills him, it’s the unnecessary use of power tools for sound effects. He’s going to have to try to come up with something to _like_ about this show so Maka’s article doesn’t turn into a total flame.

Maka looks about as displeased as he feels, but Black Star is rocking out with the best of them. When the song ends, Soul’s grateful for the screaming crowd just to get that insidious time signature out of his head. There is nothing fun about counting in seven. The sound of applause has a more pleasant rhythm than that.

The crowd dies back down, but Tezca doesn’t dive straight into a second song, instead pausing to announce, “I actually have a special surprise guest joining me today.” Special guest is promising; hopefully Mortimer is up at the front snapping some pictures. The audience is hushed with energy. “You may have seen our recent online collaboration, but only now can we perform it together in person. Put your hands together for **Death. The. Kid!** ”

A scream passes through the crowd as the lights go up again. Soul’s jaw drops as a familiar, shoulder-padded silhouette comes into view behind the drumset. If only the camera would pan over to confirm his suspicions… Tezca hands the microphone to his new guest and seals the deal though. Sure enough, Mortimer’s soft-spoken voice rings out. “I heard you all enjoyed that thirteen-eight beat.”

Maka slowly grabs Soul’s arm, saying nothing but clearly asking with the scrunch of her eyebrows if she’s more than just stoned.

“No, this is actually happening,” he assures her, though not any less stupefied.

“DANG that’s Morty. Yoo!” Black Star whoops, and Maka’s drifting eyes land on one of the display screens as comprehension sinks in. Her camera still hangs around Mortimer’s neck, and he raises it to snap a picture of the crowd.

“I hope you’ll like this just as much,” he says, gently setting the camera behind him and taking up a pair of drumsticks instead.

Soul can’t even count the beats in the measure. It’s like two measures of seven but with an extra measure of nine in between just to make the brain hurt. Music is supposed to be enjoyable, not remind Soul of middle-school algebra, but here he is, being forced to listen to this 23/8 calamity of the ears.

The only saving grace, much as he hates to admit it, is Black Star’s enthusiasm for ‘Death the Kid’-- while his dancing is ninety percent obnoxious, the remainder is half infectious and half endearing. When the song ends, the three of them head stageside to wait for Mortimer to climb down, and Black Star tackles him in a hug as soon as he’s clear of the security check. “Dude, that was amazing. I didn’t know you played!”

Mortimer stands stock still for a second before returning Black Star’s affection with a singular, but genuine, pat on the back. “We listened to some of my remixes in the car.”

“Shut up! You didn’t tell me? Bro-code, not cool, but _that_ was legit.”

Soul and Maka share a look remembering their unbridled distaste for anything and everything he had put on the speakers, but there’s no need to ruin the moment.

“I got some pictures for you, Maka,” Mortimer says. “Hopefully they fit your needs.”  

“I’m sure they’re great. I appreciate it.” She smiles, first at him but then at Soul too as she picks her next words very carefully. “That was uh… a surprise!” Being a musician explains what he was hauling in that giant trunk of his, and how he could mistake it for being compact considering it contained _an entire drum set_.

“Are you guys ready to go to the next show?” Soul asks, checking the time on his phone. “I only scheduled for half of Tezca’s set.” There should still be forty five minutes left of the next act on his list.

Maka nods her approval, but Black Star hesitates. “I kinda want to catch the rest of this one, Morty, you in?”

Ignoring Black Star’s use of the nickname he hadn’t appreciated earlier today, Mortimer says, “We can regroup over there. Let’s exchange numbers in case we get split up.” He then hands his phone to Soul, who is now forced to accept that he’s about to be on a texting basis with him, too.

Soul and Maka split off to see a punk duo, and they sit in the grass while Soul narrates notes of things for her to write about while she jots them down. They both find it helps her from zoning out too poorly. As the night drags on, they regroup and rearrange a number of times: Maka actually ventures off with Star to go to the dance tent once she regains her grasp on reality, leaving Soul with Mortimer to watch a stellar electro-violinist. Eventually they all end up back at the mainstage, though, for the closing show of the night: Killik Rung.

It’s after the main headliner, so the crowd is starting to wind down, most people choosing to sit rather than stand for the smooth jazz guitar underlaid by the definition of chill beats. Mortimer heads to the front to take a couple more pictures in front of the barrier while the rest of them lounge on the grass slope as the music dwindles.

Not a bad way to end the night.

Of course, walking back to the campground when they’re all exhausted and surrounded by equally exhausted concert goers is less fun. But they run into Spirit and Stein about halfway back and hearing about their night is a decent distraction from having to walk uphill. It’s so dark they have to navigate by a combination of astronomy and sheer luck until they happen to wander close enough to recognize where they are.

They get back to the campsite and promptly collapse into seats under the canopy. It’s fast approaching the point in the night at which time ceases to exist and the twilight zone bursts to life. While everyone is too tired to take another step, they are simultaneously awake and antsy. Maka flops onto the blowup couch next to Soul, startling him as she immediately curls into his side with a sigh.

“Tired?” he asks, trying his best to turn his head while keeping his shoulder still for her to use a pillow. If only it were acceptable to have an arm around Maka’s shoulder-- and not because current company thinks he’s gay, but because he actually likes her. Soul tries his best not to read into any sleepy nuzzling.

She nods into his arm and whispers, “I’m just glad I’m not high anymore. That was an ordeal.”

That’s good to hear. Mortimer seems to have been pretty successful with the camera too; he’s scrolling through the display now and doesn’t look _displeased_ with the results.

“Beer, anyone?” Spirit says, depositing a sixpack on the table. There are a few takers for a nightcap, but even if Soul wanted one, he wouldn’t move for the world right now. Until Maka shivers and tucks her knees a notch higher, that is. He shrugs off his jacket to spread over their legs as a lap blanket before returning to his duty of being her headrest. It gets him a raised eyebrow from Black Star, but they’ve all reached such equivalent states of Melted that not even Spirit makes a comment.

“One last picture,” Mortimer says, holding up the camera in Soul and Maka’s direction.

Maka smiles, tired but still adorable and a little radiant in the lantern light. The shutter goes off, and Soul’s eyes are on her when the camera clicks. He sincerely hopes he does not look like a serial killer. Mortimer turns off the camera and hands it back to Maka, but she sets it in front of them without turning it back on. Soul itches to grab it and scroll through all of the photos, but admittedly it’s the last one that interests him more than the rest.

“I’m retiring for the evening,” Mortimer announces. “Tezca is coming by early to drop off my belongings and I’d like to be dressed by then.”

He starts a chain reaction, and everyone slowly trails off to bed as they finish their drinks, even though the campground is still alive with after partying. Black Star is the last to go before Soul and Maka are left alone under the canopy. He pats Soul on the shoulder on his way to the tent and says, “Make good choices,” making them both splutter.

He just had to go and break the spell on suspended reality; Maka seems to realize that they are effectively as alone as they can be in a crowded campsite and toeing the ‘just friends’ line. Leaning away, lies back so her head is propped up on the arm of the couch instead of Soul’s shoulder. She takes off her shoes and stretches her feet over his knees, though, and Soul tucks his jacket around her feet and asks, “You falling asleep?”

“No,” she answers. “I think I slept too much during the day.”

Soul leans back on the couch, his head hanging back. “I can almost see the stars like this, he comments.” A sliver of night sky hangs in the only part of his vision not blocked by the canvas canopy roof.

“Really?” Maka asks, craning her neck for a glimpse.

“Yeah, just a sec.” Soul tries to leverage the couch back a little with his feet, but their weight is holding it down and he has to move her feet to stand and drag it a few feet until the sky is in view.

Maka lifts her feet to let him back under, and they sit in silence for a moment, before she says, “So, Harvar told me your mom is a producer?”

He readjusts his jacket over them with a sigh. She was bound to find out sooner or later -- he’s surprised it actually took this long.

* * *

 

He doesn’t confirm or deny it immediately, but his extended silence is confirmation even before he slowly says, “Yeah, and my dad is a composer.”

“So, your whole family is in music,” Maka says, filling in the few spaces left in the story and left between them.

Soul shrugs, playing with the hem of his jacket. “It’s what we’re good at. I tried to branch off into something else, but ended up in sound engineering, so I guess I didn’t make it all that far.”

“I think you’re doing something really good.”

“Yeah?” he turns to look her in the eye, and she wills him to understand she isn’t simply passing judgement on his career path. It’s become increasingly obvious that his sacrifices in his personal life aren’t for his own benefit, and seeing him for what kind of person he really is only further blurs the line she had put between them.

“Yeah,” Maka whispers. She sneaks a hand under their makeshift coat-blanket hybrid until her pinky finds his. Tentatively, Soul twines their fingers, but only halfway. One foot in and one foot out is just how they are right now.

Sometime later, the stars start fading for the approaching sun, and they really need to get some sleep before the morning bakes them in the tent again. There’s another full afternoon of concerts to go to before they can go home and crash. Maka locks her camera back inside the car and crawls into the tent after Soul. There’s Black Star’s sleeping body to contend with, but he doesn’t seem to notice them clambering over him. He doesn’t even stir when Maka’s foot collides with the back of his head, which is potentially valuable information for the future. For now, she settles into her crowded little corner and dozes off.

In one of the pre-dawn hours, an arm drapes over Maka’s back. She’s conflicted if she should try to move it or not, but the weight feels secure and it’s really not much different than how they were last night. She decides to let herself be comfortable until the sun rises for real, resting a hand over the one wrapped around her.

The sun sheds light on a very different scenario when Maka wakes, groggy, to harsh light glaring in through the tent screen. She twists around to see if she’s the first one up and comes to learn it is not Soul next to her, clinging like a koala on a tree. In his mobile sleep phase, Black Star must have rolled over the top of him and taken his place, and is now contentedly snoring in her ear. She needs ten showers. She needs _fire_.

Maka begins the extraction process, but in her haste, Black Star starts to wake up. He is significantly less horrified by the current situation, and rolls over into Soul mumbling, “I wanna be the little spoon.”

“Leave me alone,” Soul grumbles, trying to inch away but getting nowhere within the small confines of the tent.

“Not you, dingus,” Black Star says, wiggling further into his sleeping bag, his butt shimmying at her. “I was talking to the third wheel.”

All hell breaks loose as Soul frantically tries to get the tent open without Maka physically launching herself through one of the walls en route to freedom. Mortimer stirs in his coffin of a tent when she bursts free, and he doesn’t look amused over the commotion.

“Can you three keep it down over there?” he snipes.

* * *

The last day of the festival is a little less stressful at least. For one thing, Maka isn’t blazed today so she can actually take her own pictures and focus on concerts instead of getting distracted by how the soft the grass is. Newsflash: the grass isn’t that soft.

Shows run until sunset so there isn’t another late night. Unfortunately, packing up the campsite in the semi-darkness is just as bad, and waiting for enough people to pack up for them to be able to get out to the road is far worse. Maka insures Soul gets the aux cord for the drive back, her only request being that he doesn’t play anything that’ll make her fall asleep at the wheel.

The best part about all living in the same building is that she doesn’t have to drop anyone off before getting to go home and crash. Maka doesn’t even bother unpacking the car.

“Hey,” Soul says, brushing her elbow before they all part ways, as if he needs to touch her to have her full attention. “Let me know when you wanna work on that article, yeah?”

“Okay,” she answers, holding his eyes for a second too long before dragging herself away and into bed.

Twelve hours of sleep isn’t enough to make up for a couple of nigh-sleepless nights, but it’s all she can get away with. Kim wants her review to go out on Friday, and she has a lot of pictures to sort through. Maka plugs the camera into her laptop and starts sorting photos into folders: one for her boss and one for her mom. It’s been long enough since the divorce, her mom might even appreciate the nostalgia of a picture of her daughter and ex-husband. That’s one for the ‘mom’ folder.

After most everything is sorted, there’s still one picture Maka doesn’t know what to do with. It turned out a little grainy and underexposed, and it isn’t really newspaper material or something she’d send off to Mama, but she just can’t bring herself to delete the picture of her and Soul. She really wishes she’d noticed the way he was looking at her, but now all she has is photographic evidence. No matter how many words a picture is worth, Maka thinks it’s about time they had a talk to reassess where they stand; it’s clear they’re both somewhere a little past friendship and she’d like to meet him on common ground.

 _[[are you free? i’m going through concert stuff]]_ she texts, and then with a surge of bravery, she adds, _[[do you want to come over?]]_

She’s never invited him into her apartment before but it’s a surefire way to get five minutes or privacy -- enough for Maka to tell him that while his situation is still bullshit, her views have changed.

Soul replies _[[right now?]]_ and she has to resist biting her cheek as she texts back, _[[Yes, right now]]_ before she lets herself second guess everything ad infinitum. He gets there fast, showing up at her door looking like he just woke up from a coma.

“Come on in,” Maka says, opening her door to him.

It’s human instinct to look around a new place, but it still makes her self conscious watching him survey her inner sanctuary. “It smells good in here, candle-scoundrel.”

“I try.” She ushers him to sit on the couch in front of her open laptop.

“Don’t let Morty find out or else Death the Kid might show up with a chainsaw-drumset combo piece.” He scoots over to make space for her, but doesn’t shy away when she closes that space again. Shoulders sloped, hands on his knees, eyes scanning everything between her eyes and her neck, he turns to her and asks, “These the pictures?”  

“Yeah.” Maka leans over to unlock her computer. “I was just setting some aside to send my mom. You can go through them if you want.”

He scans through the first folder quickly, his face twisting when he gets to Wes’s heavily posed shots from behind stage. “These turned out really good. You’re gonna have a hard time picking just a couple.”

“Kim said any extras can go in a slideshow on the website,” Maka says, clicking over to the next folder for him.

There’s more pictures of their friends in the one for her mom, shots they hadn’t noticed Mortimer taking. Soul pauses on one of them all piled in the grass, cast in the purple glow of a lightshow looking like they actually enjoy each other’s company. He gets to the end and clicks minimize. “What’s this folder?”

“Oh that’s--” It’s too late is what it is.

Soul clicks on the folder containing solely the picture of the two of them and dumbly says, “Oh.” Maka looks at the picture, then back at Soul, but he’s still staring at the screen. There’s no way around it; they look like a couple. Her head is leaned against his shoulder with a dopey grin on her face while his eyes are locked on her and nothing else. “It’s a good picture,” he murmurs.

“Yeah,” Maka agrees. “Maybe not for the newspaper, though.”

“You should send it to me.”

Maka nods and reaches to close the laptop. Surely this staring contest can’t go on much longer before one of them says something, but Soul’s mouth is firmly shut and she wonders if he’s waiting for her to say something. When she does speak, she should probably say something real and not just agree to email him a romantic photo of the two of them while ignoring the implications.

“I wanna talk,” she finally blurts.

Soul blinks. “Okay.”

“About us.”

 _Now_ he reacts, finally glancing away towards the ceiling, or the window-- anywhere but her face. He says, “I mean, you know where I’m at. I’m trying not to be weird about it, but I like you.” Soul cards his fingers through his hair, stealing peeks at her to see if she’s still with him or not. “I just know you’re… not okay with everything with Black Star, so I’m leaving that to y--”

That’s more than enough confirmation for Maka. She’s been dying to kiss him and she’s run out of reasons not to. Locking her knees so her legs don’t nervously bounce holes through the floor, she cups his chin and leans forward. It takes Soul a moment to respond, his breath halting against her soft kiss, but then he’s pressing his lips to hers, one of his hands dragging up the back of her neck and getting lost in her hair.

Everything is  _so right_ it sends a pang through Maka’s heart that it has to be secret. That probably means she has to leave it out of her letter to her mom, too.

All good things must come to an end. Soul pulls back, eyebrows furrowed. “Maka,” he starts, biting his lip. His fingers still tangle slowly in her hair, unwilling to stop. “This is…”

Her stomach drops. “Something’s wrong.”

Soul exhales long and heavy. “It feels unfair to Black Star.”

“But--” That’s not the reason Maka was searching for, and she can’t fathom how it affects him until she thinks about the whole picture. “Ah. Mortimer.”

“Yeah.” His hands come forward to wrap around hers, giving them a faint squeeze before redepositing them back on her side of the couch. “Star really likes him, but Mortimer doesn’t -- and probably can’t ever -- _know_.”

Just when she was starting to enjoy life with him in it, he has to go and be the better person. Maka grinds the heels of her hands into her eyes to keep any uninvited tears from welling up. She didn’t sign up for feelings. “Ugh,” she growls. “I hate this. I also hate that I give a crap about Black Star’s happiness.”   

Soul huffs a quiet laugh. “He grows on you. Hey, you know we’re still going to hang out, right?”

Maka’s palms slide down her face, revealing Soul peering at her with Concerned™ eyes. Just because they’re not taking the next step forward doesn’t mean they need to take a step back, either. “Of course,” she laughs, because crying is messy. “You have to help me with this article.”

“I think Blair and Snappy would miss you, too. Even Star might be attached now.”  
  
“I’ll visit the animals but I don’t think I want your husband attached to me. I already lived that.”   

Everything is fine. Even if they have to hold off on romance for a while, and Maka doesn’t quite know what their future looks like, she’s confident it’ll be a wild ride. She’s grown accustomed to a certain level of excitement, so she’d be disappointed to have it any other way. Maka gets out her scribbled notes from Bode Thunder and opens a new document while Soul rambles about how he never wants to go to another metal show in his life.  

They laugh about a weekend of mishaps, eat an entire pizza, and cobble together a passable review of the weekend for Maka to send to Kim. And, when Soul heads back to his own apartment, she opens one more blank document to start drafting a letter to her mom. There’s a lot to catch Mama up on.


	4. Epilogue

Contrary to popular belief, Wes Evans is not as awe-inspiringly perfect as he knows many people believe him to be. For one, he has pores, just like everyone else. For two, his eyes are blue, but he wears contacts to make them the icy glaciers the fans know and love.

He’s even cheated on a math test, once.

But most importantly: he isn’t desperately in love with every pretty thing on legs that passes him by. Being flirtatious is not only part of his skillset, but a major aspect of his career-- though it has never netted him love.

Maybe he’s just coming at it the wrong way, but he doesn’t know any other way to go about it! Try as he might, he just can't find someone he wants the way his brother wants Maka Albarn. 

Mortimer Kidner is a very, very pretty man. Wes would know, as he is one for a living. Kidner has fashion sense, seems pretty grounded, and had appeared available. But, no dice. No matter how hard Wes tried, this guy would not give him the time of day.

Well. Wes knows when to admit defeat. He’s not oblivious. Kidner very obviously has eyes only for Wes’s brother in law, Bartholomew “Black Star” Whatever-his-name-was-but-should-have-been-changed-to-Evans.

Soon to be **un** -brother in law. For some reason, he had to tag along to this get-together, and Wes Evans finds himself in Soul’s tiny kitchenette, witness to a very strange performance. He’s not even sure what had started it-- had there been a rehearsal? Was it all impromptu? The last thing he confidently knew had happened was Soul striding to the front door, clapping a hand on Black Star’s shoulder, and saying:

“These are your shorts.”

 **And then all hell broke loose.** Wes and Harvar hovered nervously in the kitchen as Black Star hurled open the front door, started shouting obscenities, and (very, Very unjustly) accused Soul of adultery. Names were called, yoga pants were thrown, and now the scene has escalated to such worrisome magnitudes that Mortimer Kidner has briskly arrived, coming up the stairs to investigate the madness.

“I DEMAND YOU SIGN THESE DIVORCE PAPERS,” Black Star, well, _demands_ , shoving the documents into Soul’s chest with an impressive flourish.

“I COULDN’T BE HAPPIER,” Soul returns just as loud, though Wes’s little brother seems on the verge of laughter, which makes things confusing.

 _“What in the seven circles of hell is going on here?”_ Mortimer says-- ah, he looks dashing when he’s angry. “Your neighbors are threatening to report your disturbance to the authorities--”

Ignoring the building manager, Soul and Black Star turn in unison, both barking, “Harvar!”

The assistant drifts forward, a hand tightly gripping that Filofax Wes gave him for Christmas last year-- so adorable-- readying it as an emergency weapon.

“NOTARIZE US,” the husbands demand. Because that’s why he and Harv are here in the first place: Harvar is many things, and being a traveling notary is but one of his many talents.

After they scribble their names in various places while still standing awkwardly in the doorway, Kidner watching in dumbfounded silence, Donut notarizes them. Duty complete and a cheque tucked away in the planner, Harvar returns to the kitchenette.

“ALRIGHT!” Black Star caws, “Good enough!” He and his former husband give each other a high-five.

“Please, either one of you, **explain immediately**.”

Black Star hooks an arm behind Soul’s neck, pulling him down to a more appropriate height, and says to Mortimer, “Guess what man, we just got divorced!”

“Yep,” Soul confirms agreeably.

“...Um??”

Black Star waves the divorce papers like a victory flag. Ducking out from under his ex-husband’s arm, Soul says, “I love someone else, and he loves someone else, so this seemed like the right move.”

“Yeah, about that,” Black Star says, stepping forward and grinning as Mathcore superstar Death The Kid tints a very becoming shade of pink, “How do you feel about deadlifts?”

Wes is then subjected to watching something he would personally describe as a crime against his eyes. His little brother also abandons ship, stealing the divorce papers out of Black Star’s otherwise occupied hands and dashing down the stairs to, Wes assumes, apartment fourteen.

Model, musician, and beauty guru Wes Evans: rejected for a guy with a pet alligator and bad taste in yoga pants.

He leans on the kitchen counter with a sigh, watching as his assistant crosses off a few things in his bullet journal. “Harvar, what’s love like?”

The man’s pen actually pauses. “Willful suffering,” he replies.

Wes isn’t sure what he means by that, but says, somewhat without meaning to, “If I asked you to go out with me, what would you say?”

Harv lifts up his sunglasses and gives him a considering look. “Depends. Are you asking me on the clock or off?”


End file.
